Richard's American Train Adventures

[richard carr]

Friday morning I picked up a car at 6am and set off to explore Lima Ohio. Thats where they used to build steam locos.

The route there takes you along US30 which parallels the Chicago Fort Wayne and Eastern most of the way to Fort Wayne

First stop was going to be Warsaw Indiana, here the CFWE crosses the NS Indianapolis to Goshen route in the town centre.

I parked up by the tracks and then got a phone call from the Boss saying the TV in the spare bedroom wasn't working just as I heard a horn and this appeared.





Typical just when I didn't want to try to fix the TV

The rear loco is one of the rebuilt SD75s now with AC traction motors

I then carried on to Lima still 2 hours further on.

In theory there's quite a lot at Lima, the main route is CSX from Toledo to Cincinnati that passes through Deshler. There is a decent sized yard at the north end of town.
This is then crossed by the CFWE in the town centre. The Indiana and Ohio also has it's own route through the town and a yard to the east of the CSX one. It gets crossed by the CFWE too.

Norfolk Southern also has a route to Lima from Fostoria it splits off the main Fort Wayne line in Arcadia and heads through Findlay to Lima.
They appear to serve the large refinery in the southern part of town near the old loco works. This also crosses the I&OR and joins the CSX route for the last few miles through the town centre to the refinery.


I went to the CSX/CFWE crossing and found this parked up




It turned out to be heading north once it got moving, just as this came in from NS







I set off after the train, unfortunately I got stuck at every set of traffic lights and the train was no where to be seen when I arrived.

I waited for a while and eventually it ran round it's train and appeared.








Next I heard a horn on the mainline so crossed the road to see what was coming




It's the first responders CSX loco on the point








I was hoping that the NS train would leave now, but no luck, they just turned off the headlights and powered down the loco.

So I set off to explore the I&OR.

 

[richard carr]

The I&OR yard and mainline run down North Sugar Street. The I&OR shares the CSX main from just north of Lima to just south of Leipsic.
So the I&OR splits off CSX to run independently through Lima and then south to Springfield about 80 miles away.

This is the NS crossing the I&OR. The tracks heading right are NS those on the left I&OR, yes it is one of those jump crossings.




This is looking west along the NS tracks towards downtown Lima where it joins the CSX tracks. There is connection to the I&OR


This is looking north east along the NS tracks towards Fostoria


This is looking south along the I&OR



This is looking north along the I&OR, the track coming in from the left is the connecter from the NS and that going off to the right leads to a small yard, the main I&OR yard is further up on the left




Nothing was happening, then again it was 2pm on a Friday afternoon and most shortlines have packed in for the weekend by now.
I did drive up Sugar Street past the I&OR offices and there was a GP38 parked up but there wasn't anywhere to stop and take a picture unfortunately.

I turned round back into Lima, I even went back to the refinery but the SD40 was still there powered down, it's probably still there now.

I then went back round into Lima again followed the road over the yard but couldn't see anything and you can't stop.

Then I saw these gates go down so pulled in and grabbed this shot of a stone train heading north.






So I set off after him expecting to pass him before Ottawa about 20 miles north.
I even ended going past the I&OR offices again, this time there were 2 GP38s parked up !

 

[Osgood]

...... yes it is one of those jump crossings.

Model that, @Jordan or Plymouth Mad I dare you!

I imagine the continuous rail is prone to fracture along the flange contact line!
Looks like the flanges take the load all along the heavy ramps as well as across the 90 deg. rail.

Never thought I'd see anything like that on tinplate Hornby, let alone a full size railway......

 

[richard carr]

So I set off north along SR65, fortunately this parallels the railway for quite a way but some of it is hidden by trees. There's the Eagle Railcar repair facility a few miles out of town and there did appear to be what might be a train there, but it could have been just a line of cars awaiting repair.
I got to Columbus Grove when I saw a stone train heading south, so did a quick 180 and headed south after it, I caught it up a few miles further south.




I then got back in the car, drove over the crossing as sat nav now said go that way, but in the distance was a head light, so that must have been a train at the Eagle Car repairs.
Another quick turnaround and back at the crossing I was expecting the north bound stone train but no it was the first responders again, it hadn't got far in the past 2 hours.






I jumped back in the car and headed to Ottawa, I caught it again there and this time shot a bit of video.

I then moved on to Leipsic and parked up by the crossing with the NS line, I soon head a train horn to the south and this time I was expecting 911 again but no now it's the stone train.

 

[richard carr]

After this had passed by I started back to the hotel in Maumee (Toledo), it took me along SR65 again and past the ethanol plant to where it crosses the CSX main, here I found ES40DC 5452 switching coil cars at the Protec steel coating plant (a lot of galvanizing according to their website). I hadn't seen CSX doing this before it had always been NS doing it from their line with a daily local train from Bellevue/Fostoria.




The switching ended up pushing a large number cars into the plant



Then the loco came out light engine and sat and waited for a while, which could only mean that something else was arriving on the main.



And here it is arriving from Deshler



Once it had gone passed the loco moved forward to clear the signal and then reversed south along the main. That's the Mars Iams plant in the background, Petfood.



Then it was time to head to the hotel without stopping at Deshler.

 

[Jordan or Plymouth Mad]

Model that, @Jordan or Plymouth Mad I dare you!

I would dearly have liked to model a 90° flat crossing as they are a signature feature of US railroading, 'but'.... I would want such a feature to be workable on all routes - a proper interlocking if you will, not just as a 'dummy' feature where the one route is cosmetic only. Realistically, that's all I could fit on a shelf layout, so I didn't do it.

 

[richard carr]

Jim had let me know that after a 12 hour drive back from Canada he wasn't going to meet up at 7am, considering how jet lagged I felt that seemed like a really good idea to me.

So I setoff about 10am to go the Railpark in Walbridge, it's at the north end of Walbridge yard about half an hour from the hotel.



You could hear this grumbling away behind the trees before it finally emerged into the open, an SD70ACC





Yes that car is in the path of a moving train.

Here I'm looking south along the east side of the yard, most of the tracks are to the right and hidden behind trees, thats where this train is heading. The train has most likely arrived from Stanley yard which runs parallel to Walbridge yard about 2 miles to the west, both of these yards are now CSX but originally one was B&O and one C&O or something like that.

Yes that's another jump crossing, that takes the former PRR line from Tiffin (where it joins the CSX main B&O line) over the tracks that run to the port and joins the tracks to Stanley yard.





A Lake State Railway SD70AH T4, this was being turned on the triangle, sorry Y.







Next this train of autoracks came out of the yard



They were crossing over to the left hand tracks to put a train together, only the lead loco was working.





They are now pushing back on to the left hand tracks.



Shortly after this Jim arrived and not a lot happened so we headed off to Fostoria.

 

[Big Train James]

I'll post a Toledo Terminal map tomorrow that will explain how all the trackage in this area is arranged. It's pretty involved even now, although nothing like the old days. Toledo used to have a lot going on until the industries moved away.

 

[Big Train James]

The area in question in Richard's post is Walbridge, which is in the southeast corner of the map. The Terminal tracks are indicated in bold, forming a complete loop around Toledo. There are plenty of interesting interchange track arrangements all around town, but it gets pretty crowded on the southeast side. There's the C&O yard lead to the south, the C&O lead to the north to connect to the NYC to access the union station downtown, and then the PRR line coming up from Carruthers crosses all of them. Then mixed in is the the Terminal through route plus its interchange with the C&O. Stanley Yard and its interchanges with the Terminal happen just to the west of Walbridge.

Regrettably, quite a bit of what is seen on this map no longer exists. Only half of the Terminal loop remains, the PRR yard and trackage north have been gone for decades, most yards have been reduced in scale or repurposed, and all of the trackage into downtown warehouse districts has been gone for decades as well. Toledo is now largely a place that trains go through, rather than to or from. That's progress, but it's not as much fun.

 

[richard carr]

Thank Jim for posting the map

We soon got to Fostoria and the first train to arrive was this



A dreadful photo really but unfortunately that is the problem with Fostoria for most of the day the sun is un the wrong place and the CSX main is a 5 minute walk from the NS main where the parking is.

It doesn't get any better with the next one



This time it's CP with a KCS loco behind it taking a stack train east, which I think is fairly unusual, you do see these going through Deshler but I assumed that the trains changed power at North Baltimore, I haven't seen a CP loco at Fostoria before.

We could see that something was going on in the NS yard so we drove over there to see what if anything was going on.




It turned out to be lots of swtching with an SD40-2, a former conrail one that didn't have the HTC trucks that most SD40-2s have.



The large gap between the trucks and the fuel tank gives this away.

Oh and that looks like a switch with a jump frog !



The big gap between the fuel tank and trucks








An ADM tank car, Atlas make those and I have some





So after watching the switching for well over an hour it was time to head back to the hotel and head out for a steak dinner.

 

[richard carr]

Sunday morning I was away from Toledo before 8am. The plan was to stop off in Sturgis again to get breakfast and to see what had changed from 2 weeks ago.

This time I found the loco



and 2 tank cars parked at the northern end of the spur



This tank wasn't there 2 weeks ago and the hopper car is different too.



The one with losts of grafitti does look like one from 2 weeks ago.



And finally I managed to get a front shot of the loco.



I carried on to Elkhart, starting at the Amtrak station, I had only been there for 5 minutes and I heard the first horn, but I wasn't expecting this







One SD40 with dynamic brakes and one without



Another 5 minutes and a stack train came powering through





Then it all goes quiet again.

 

[richard carr]

So once those had gone by I went to the west end of the yard

A pair of yard switchers with gondolas, but not a lot else was happening



Then this train of autoracks pulled up, stopped and waited



Finally it got going



but as it did, this arrived





Is it going to get out of the way?



No it didn't, just typical !



So after this I headed back to Des Plaines hobbies and went shopping.

 

[Suddaby]

Hi Richard,

Thanks for posting all your photos, I've found them really interesting, with everything seeming to be on a different scale over there!
Do they have something like Realtimetrains, so that you can keep track of what might be coming along at any particular place you happen to be. I get the impression you just turn up and take pot luck by the lineside!
Cheers,

Kevin

 

[richard carr]

Hi Kevin

there's no equivalent of real time trains in the US. Amtrak has a tracking APP for their trains but it's only their trains.

On the class 1 railroads they operate on a daily schedule (Precision Scheduled Railroading) but that's still very fluid, a freight might be scheduled to depart at say 10am in a morning but that in reality means anything from from about 8am to 4pm for the actual departure.

On shortlines then it tends to be when they need to run one, most will do 1 train a day in each direction, the bigger ones may need more than that.

So yes it's very hit and miss and patience is certainly a virtue.

Richard

 

[Jordan or Plymouth Mad]

Thanks for posting all your photos, I've found them really interesting, with everything seeming to be on a different scale over there!

To give you an idea of the difference in loading gauge, here's a photo from when new Canadian-built Class 66s were being taken to the docks for shipment to the UK....



....so that gives you some idea of how tall Autorack cars are, and double-stack container trains.

 

[richard carr]

I was supposed to go on a 10 day holiday to Oregon and California last Thursday with my friend David but work has got in the way so instead we got a weekend in Iowa.

It turns out that's nowhere as bad as it sounds.

The first stop was Clinton, it's only a few weeks since I was here, but this time it was a Friday, so I was hoping to catch some locals operating.

We pulled up by the bank of the Mississippi to get a flavour of the place, we turn round and here's the first train of the day crossing the bridge





UP loves to give plenty of power to it's stack trains so 4 on the front and 2 in the middle, for over 25,000 HP on the train.



Next we stopped by where the Praire Lines depot, here's an ADM MP15 DC loco that I hadn't seen before.





We then went off to see what was happening at the UP yard and the freight yard about half a mile away from there, the answer was nothing, so we haeded back to the mainline, I went to check the signals and yes something was on the way.


It took quite a while before it showed up





An SD40 in the consist

 

[richard carr]

In the distance we could hear a horn, so we set off to investigate and found this



It was switching cars round the back of the ADM factory.





We stood and watched this for nearly an hour as it went back and forth over the crossing moving long lines of cars.

We then went back to the mainline but on the other side this time (south side).
This is looking towards the bridge over the Mississippi, the line directly in front connects round to the ADM site where saw the switcher in action, it also leads down to CP.

The tracks in the background go over the bridge and the furthest one joins the CP mainline north to Dubuque




There was another railfan there and he told us a UP train was due from the south to be quickly followed a by a CP train heading south to pass another one at Camanche about 6 miles south of Clinton

Here's the UP train with an ACe on the point.


A DPU in the middle

and a pusher at the back.



The CP train arrived shortly after this

It's the heritage liveried ACe on the point with a very mixed consist





A pair of GP40s




We set off after the train, but I took a wrong turning on the way to Camanche and we arrived there as this train was leaving and the other train had departed north.

So we set off for Cedar Falls 2 and half hours away.

Richard

 

[mickoo]

Hi Richard,

Thanks for posting all your photos, I've found them really interesting, with everything seeming to be on a different scale over there!
Do they have something like Realtimetrains, so that you can keep track of what might be coming along at any particular place you happen to be. I get the impression you just turn up and take pot luck by the lineside!
Cheers,

Kevin

Not unusual to go 3-4 hours with nothing, even on Transcon 2 which is about the busiest freight line in the US (some Powder River sections might just top it) but then you'll get a massive slug of trains back to back.

I got hit bad in the Gorge a few years back, they were doing tie replacement way down toward Portland but shut the whole section from Portland to Pasco down (just shy of 200 miles) from around 08:00 to 16:00, they let the daily Amtraks and trash trains though but everything else ran over night. That's been going on for a month before I got there and two of my three weeks, I gave up and went to Montana. Problem was, even opening it at 16:00 you're still at least 60-70 miles from where any train is starting, though Pasco would start sending stuff around Midday being 130 miles away. You can't have trains leaving and not meeting their destination in time as you then have to send dozens of crew mini vans out to take fresh crew and collect expired ones.

Even in Cajon you can easily go a couple of hours with little or no traffic.

Radios tuned the Railroad frequencies are your best bet but the that tends to be only local 10-30 miles and you do need to know the blurb and all the local call signs unique to that area to stand a chance of catching the train.

 

[richard carr]

You might be wondering why I would want to go to Cedar Falls Iowa, well Caboose Stop Hobbies is based there and it contains a treasure trove of O Scale goodies, for which the owner Merlyn, does not have a clue as to what stock they actually have. Sadly Merlyn isn't well and had to miss the March Meet in Chicago, but his wife carries on the business without him and the help of several friends.
Cedar Falls itself is quite a nice town, we stayed at the Blackhawk Hotel on Main Street, it dates from 1853, fortunately the rooms have been refurbished fairly recently and it does have air conditioning and at £113 a night I'm not going to complain. We even found a decent restaurant for dinner and very nice diner for breakfast.

So the plan for Saturday was to hit Caboose Stop Hobbies at 10am when they opened, spend and hour or so there then head out back to Waterloo to see what if anything was happening at the CN yard there. Except that I forgot that GP qualifying didn't start until 9am so that delayed everything before we even got started.

To be honest CSH seems to have sold a lot of the old stock they had when we visited a couple years ago, but they still had plenty of freight cars, so I picked up 4 more coil cars and two 17600 gallon tank cars, all at very reasonable prices.


The CN mainline bridge


The outside of the shop



We then headed over to Waterloo about 5 miles east of Cedar Falls, Canadian National have a decent size yard there, this is the former Illinois Central line to Sioux City Iowa and Omaha Nebraska. I doubt they run more than a three or 4 trains a day, but the yard was busy switching with a former EJ&E SD38-2.

I seem to have run in to a problem with this post so I'll add more photos in a new one.