2024-11-13 42 -78

Location

Cheektowaga in an old Railroad area off Losson Road

Participants

Pedalpusher

Expedition

When this hash was published, I wasn't sure this was even accessible, even though the streetview didn't show any posted signs along Losson road. The satellite imaging showed what appeared to be some kind of fence or barrier around the big field, but I had no idea what that could be about. So I clicked on the 'Nearby Geocaches' button on our awesome Geohashing.info site because every once in a while, a cache is placed in an accessible area that doesn't appear to be accessible and I'm glad I did! It showed a multi-cache that was very close which describes what this area is and why it's fenced off. From the cache page:

Many years ago, this area was part of the Gardenville Line, a very busy railroad line. This particular part of the line included a roundhouse, which is a structure that was used to repair locomotives. Of course, all of this repair work took place during a time when businesses didn't consider the environmental impact of their operations. Hence the large fenced off portion of this area. That part of the yard was remediated and capped. The railroad that last owned the land has gone bankrupt, therefore and no one wants to claim ownership of the area.

More importantly, it showed that not only could I park at the gate by the road (parking area indicated for the cache), but I could get to this hash and it wasn't in the 'exclusion zone'. Since it wasn't so far away from Downtown (and I drove into work today), I decided to go at lunch which then wouldn't interfere with plans in the evening (or losing light after work).

Following my phone GPS, I didn't have any trouble getting over there and I parked in the driveway to the hash area. It was a wide driveway to park in and I tried to get off to the side as it looked like an official vehicle had been down there recently based on the tire tracks in the mud. The mud was easy to avoid and as I walked back, I saw there was a very tall fence around the blocked off area with some kind of shed or building in the corner. I crossed over to the fence and walked along it to get to the other side by the hash. There were deer trails all over so it wasn't hard to move through the high grass and avoid the pricker bushes that were all over.

The hash area was mostly open and it was an easy GPS dance with the HashDroid app to start a Consecutive Streak. Retracing my steps, I was back at the office in time for my next meeting. My next attempt to continue my Streak can be found here and yesterday's expedition is here.

Too early to call, but this may be a Last Man Standing. Will keep an eye on this for that ribbon.