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Classic Train Questions Part Deux (50 Years or Older)

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Posted by CSSHEGEWISCH on Monday, June 18, 2018 10:08 AM

K4sPRR was the first to get it right and gets the next question.

The daily commute is part of everyday life but I get two rides a day out of it. Paul
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Posted by K4sPRR on Monday, June 18, 2018 7:54 PM

Here goes...This small class one eastern railroad had its roots as an interurban line.  Its two divisions covered two states, the problem, they were not connected.  An attempt to connect them was made but some neigboring railroads blocked the work by filing a law suit alleging it would create a monopoly primarily in the textile industry.  The textile industry had some influence on the roads slogan.  The Supreme Court agreed and the connection project abandonded.  What railroad, what States and what road was primarily responsible for the suit?  Extra credit, what was the slogan?

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Posted by Deggesty on Monday, June 18, 2018 8:36 PM

The Piedmont and Northern was unique in its operation since its two divisions could not be joined into one; One segment ran between Charlotte and Gastonia, North Carolina (with a branch to Belmont); the other segment ran between Spartanburg and Greenwood, South Carolina (with a branch to Anderson).  I believe it was the Southern that blocked its desire (the proposed connection parraleld the Southern between Gastonia and Spartanburg). The road apparently was lined with cotton mills, since it proclaimed "A Mill to the Mile."

I was never able to ride it, but often when I went up to Charlotte by Greyhound, I could see an engine or two as the bus passed the yard.

Johnny

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Posted by daveklepper on Monday, June 18, 2018 11:58 PM

It was freight only when I had projects in the Carolinas, but I did see its locomotives and ovehead wire in Charlotte, usually after arriving or before departing on a Southern Ry train, most often the Piedmont Limited.   You got the answer before I could, and I look forward to your quesition.

I think part of the P&N survives as part of CSX.

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Posted by K4sPRR on Tuesday, June 19, 2018 6:39 AM

Congrats Deggesty, right on and with extra credit...next question is yours.

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Posted by Deggesty on Tuesday, June 19, 2018 10:57 AM

Yes the SAL or one of its successors absorbed some of the P&N.

Another shortline shared various officers and other personnel with the P&N. Name it, its terminals, and its unfulfilled aspiration.

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Posted by daveklepper on Tuesday, June 19, 2018 1:40 PM

Just a guess:  Aberdeen and Rockfish?

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Posted by Deggesty on Tuesday, June 19, 2018 1:51 PM

Sorry, Dave, it was not the Aberdeen and Rockfish.

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Posted by rcdrye on Tuesday, June 19, 2018 4:23 PM

Dave is close, though.  The Aberdeen &  Rockfish owns the Ervin-Dunn segment of the Durham & Southern, which shared officers and an OG page with the Piedmont & Northern.  The "projected" section of the P&N between Charlotte, Greensboro and Durham to connect it with the D&S, like P&N's own gap closing segment, was never built, though it showed on OG maps into the 1950s.  Acquired by SCL in 1981, the D&S was mostly spun off or abandoned. About 20 miles remain as part of CSX.  The original charter and operation before 1906 was under the name Cape Fear and Northern, but it never reached tidewater.  Both railroads were owned by the Duke family, the D&S serving lumber and tobacco producing areas.

D&S ran from Durham to Dunn NC, with interchanges with Southern, ACL and SAL.

D&S had several second-hand Baldwin road switchers, including the only Soo Line Baldwin that was sold for further service.  Three of them were sold to Rail to Water Transfer in Chicago, where they operated in D&S paint until the early 1980s.

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Posted by Deggesty on Tuesday, June 19, 2018 4:35 PM

rcdrye

Dave is close, though.  The Aberdeen &  Rockfish owns the Ervin-Dunn segment of the Durham & Southern, which shared officers and an OG page with the Piedmont & Northern.  The "projected" section of the P&N between Charlotte and Durham to connect it with the D&S, like P&N's own gap closing segment, was never built, though it showed on OG maps into the 1950s.  Acquired by SCL in 1981, the D&S was mostly spun off or abandoned. About 20 miles remain as part of CSX.  The original charter and operation before 1906 was under the name Cape Fear and Northern, but it never reached tidewater.  Both railroads were owned by the Duke family, the D&S serving lumber and tobacco producing areas.

D&S ran from Durham to Dunn NC, with interchanges with Southern, ACL and SAL.

 

Very good--except that you did not mention interchanges with the Norfolk Southern--but I did not ask for interchanges.Smile

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Posted by rcdrye on Thursday, June 21, 2018 7:21 PM

Durham and Southern listed a bunch of interchange partners at Durham.

A large railroad system had an isolated subdivision.  Trains to and from the subdivision were handled by a boiler-equipped electric locomotive on a line usually characterized as an interurban.  Name the large railroad, the interurban, and (possibly) the subdivision name.

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Posted by daveklepper on Saturday, June 23, 2018 3:23 PM

This was the situation with the CN's Murrey Bay line when Quebec Power and Light owned the line between Quebec and St. Joachim, with CN steam operations beyond St. Joachim to Murrey Bay.  By the postwar era CN had bought the interurban line from QB&L, and while electric interurban passenger service continue to around 1964, steam and then diesels did begin running between Quebec and Murrey Bay.  The Murrey Bay Division became the Montmorency Division.

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Posted by rcdrye on Sunday, June 24, 2018 2:42 PM

Just so.  Quebec Railway Light & Power operated out of Palais Station, shared with CN and CP, and also operated the Quebec city system.

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Posted by daveklepper on Monday, June 25, 2018 12:36 AM

A Boston question.  In Boston Elevated days, the transit system had track connections with the Boston and Maine Railroad at Sommerville (surface yard, under the Elevated structure, connecting to yard and streetcar tracks) and at Everett, adjacent to Everett shops. These connections were in active use for supply delivary. There were two locatoins where elevated streetcar tracks were on the same street as in-use railraod tracks, and in both cases there were areas of interleavement, gauntlet, arrangement of tracks, but in neither case was there (as far as know) a useful track connection where a freighcar could be interchanged.   Where were those two locations?  Nieghborhood identification suffient, actual street names even better.

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Posted by daveklepper on Wednesday, June 27, 2018 9:46 AM

Hints:  At one location all streetcars using the tracks entered the subway but only used a short bit of it, two stations, the further one being the terminous for these streetcars and an extra fare charged for continuing on other subway-surface cars using these two stations.  No street track, either freight railroad or streetcar, has been at this location for around 35 years, although there remains plenty of passenger rail activity of all types close-by today.  The freight railroad was freight-only.

At the other locatoin, one of the four streetcar lines also entered the subway, entering and exiting at portals only used by that line, but at a locaton near another line's portals.  Some frieght tracks may remain, bu tno streetdar tracks.  The use of the freight tracks was by a large railroad that ran pasenger service into Boston, not the B&M, but the frieght tracks were largely owned by the Federal Government and did and may still serve a military purpose.

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Posted by rcdrye on Wednesday, June 27, 2018 1:33 PM

One of the areas was in the Fort Point area near South Station, mixing it with the Union Freight Railroad.  The other was at the surface line tunnel entrance in East Boston, not far from today's Blue Line entrance.  The tracks in question belonged to NYC's Boston and Albany, part of the "Grand Junction" branch to East Boston, some of which remains in the connector between ex-NYC and ex-B&M "T" lines.

I think there was a third area near Fresh Pond where B&M's Watertown branch was involved.  There were a couple of interchange connections, notably near the now-isolated Everett shops.

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Posted by daveklepper on Thursday, June 28, 2018 6:39 AM

You are correct about the area near South Station on Dorchester Avenue, a rush-hour only line from /South Station, out Sumner Street like the direct line to City Point, but then down Dorchester to Broadway, and then with the N. Station (short turns at Park Street) -City Point line on Broadway to City Point. But this was only one streetcar line, and no interface-gauntlet track was involved.

I rode the surface streetcar lines out of Maverick many times, and there was not any steam railroad tracks on the streets involved, The Boston and Albany Grand Junction tracks to the Harbor were on their own right-of-way, just to the west of where the Boston Revere Beach and Lynn RoW was located.

However, you are very close.  The streetcar on Dorchester did touch one the neighborhoods.

Two streetcar lines that once used the gauntlet tracks in the other neighborhood were relocated to Maverick Station instead of going downtown and entering the subway via the tracks gauntletted with steam railroad tacks.  Others were converted to bus using a tunnel and then a new major bridge.  The last passenger-carrying streetcar that used the streetcar tracks in this case on made one trip in the morning and one trip back in the evenign and was not a recognized route. just something regular riders and fans knew about.  However, much earlier, several of the streetcar lines were active competitors of steam passenger service (streetcar competitors of two railroads at one time).  Now and for a very long time bus lines.

You mentioned the correct two railroads providing freight service, Union Freight Railroad in the second case and the B&A, NYC System in the first case.  But the Grand Junction Branch was not involved.

And the rush-hour-only streetcar line on Dorchester Avenue was involved, but was only one of four streetcar lines, and one of the others was a regular user of the subway.

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Posted by rcdrye on Sunday, July 1, 2018 8:14 AM

The B&A line to the East Boston docks was listed as part of the Grand Junction branch.  I'm sure it had another, local name (Chelsea Branch?) but my copy of "The railroad that came out at night and other stories" isn't where I thought it was.  To make sure we're talking about the same line, the docks are where Alan Pegler's "Flying Scotsman" arrived in the early 1970s.  Most of the East Boston site has been obliterated by expansion of Logan Airport, but some of the tracks are still there in spots, almost completely overgrown.

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Posted by daveklepper on Tuesday, July 3, 2018 2:43 AM

All that is correct, but those tracks were NOT interleaved with the Boston Elevated or later the MTA.  They were directly adjacent to the Boston Revere Beach and Lynn overhead wire electrfied narrow gauge tracks and the ferry across Boston Harbor.  Both areas I am referring to are on the other side of the Harbor, but not too far away.  One still has a beach for summer bathers, but no streetars or other rail passenger service, and the other is still a neighborhood that is a rail transportaiton hub.   The first involved railroad tracks that may have been owned (maybe still are) by the USA Governmet although operated by one of the three major Boston freight railroads, while the second, also freight-only trackage, was owned and operated by a freight-only railroad.

None of the streetcar lines leaving the Maverick station and the across-the-platform transfers to the East Boston Tunnel operated on streets shared with railroiad tracks, althought there a few grade-crossings with railroad tracks.

Two of the liees entering Maverick station did not do so before 1935 (36?) but did nun into the subway and used the tracks in the second example discussed above.

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Posted by rcdrye on Tuesday, July 3, 2018 7:53 AM

The only US government thing I can think of is the Fore River Shipyard (now owned by the state of MAss) over in Quincy, connected to NYNH&H's Old Colony (MBTA Greenbush Line)

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Posted by daveklepper on Friday, July 6, 2018 5:52 AM

Ok, I will have to give one away.  Apparently the USA insallation and tank farm at City point that was adjecent, across the street from the locastion where City Point carhouse was, is no longer in use.  It was served by a City Point feight branch of the B&A = NYCentral system.  The Boston Army base was a neighbor and also served by this freight branch.  Is the Boston Army base still in existance?  Important in my life as a reserve Army officer post, where I left active duty to further education at MIT grad-school.

You still should be able to fathom the location of a the freight-only railroad's tracks that interleaved with streetcars that entered the subway, including two lines diverted to Maverick after 1935, with the streetcar tracks used as a service connection only several years after the last revenue line ceased, and is still an important transportation hub without the on-street streetcar and freight tracks.

At City Point, most freight was petroleum in tank cars.  I don't know the exact nature of the fuel.  Three full-time streetcar lines used the interleaved tracks, City Point to North Station via Broadway and the Subway, to Dudley via Northampton St. and Washington St,, and to South Station via Summer Street; plus one rush-hour-only line, to South Station via Broadway, Dorchester Ave., and Summer Street.

After the Bunker Hill Street and Main Street Sullivan Square - Scolley Square streetcar lines were bussed, the tracks in the second location saw paswengers qs the put-in from its barn entered the North Station - Scolley Square weekday one-car shuttle service and in the evening when it returned to its barn.  Rode the evening run twice.   The barn served one and only one full-time streetcar line, one known for beauty, with a parklike setting now sacrificed to more traffic lanes. 

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Posted by rcdrye on Friday, July 6, 2018 1:18 PM

City Point hasn't been Army for several decades.  There were usable tracks up towards Fort Point Channel, that used to head for the piers near the Convention Center, but they seem to be out of service (and partly paved over) now as well. 

The B&A line that went to East Boston ran next to the B&M's Eastern Main Line, then cut across Chelsea, crossing the Chelsea River next to the Chelsea Street Bridge.  The ROW is easy to pick out on modern Boston maps.  Until the 1990s the tracks were visible near the tank farms, and followed the Blue Line cut towards Logan Airport.  The Piers are still there, and the B&A ROW is the "East Boston Greenway" which runs about a block away from the T's Maverick Station.

There was a strange proposal floating around to use the remaining trackage for a DMU shuttle a couple of years ago.  It was not a very promising idea, and nothing came of it.

The North End surface lines were kept for access to Everett Shops for a long time after regular surface operation ended.  The connection to the Charlestown Navy Yard was crossed opposite North Station. Union Freight and Boston Elevated had some track contact on Causeway Street around North Station.  Although Everett Shops are still active, there is no longer any connection to the T lines, all equipment moves are handled by truck.

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Posted by daveklepper on Sunday, July 8, 2018 3:15 AM

The Blue Line RofW was of course the BRB&L narrow gauge RoW in the Boston Elevated days.  The Blue line deviates and moves west, southbound, where it enters the tunnel (by one block from the B&A, as you note), while the narrow gauge ran straight to the harbor, with the B&A tracks agacent.

You finally got the other locastion correct, North Station.   Still has light rail, Green Line, now underground,  Orang Line rapid transit, and diesel commuter trains, and Amtrak Downeasterner to Portland, ME. (and Brunswick?).

Your question.   

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Posted by rcdrye on Sunday, July 8, 2018 7:34 AM

Many railroads participated in pool ticket honoring arrangements, where tickets issued for one railroad could be used on another between common city pairs.  Some of the better known ones involved three railroads in the Pacific Northwest, and three railroads in the upper Midwest.  Before 1950, one of the railroads involved in one of the pools noted above also had a pool agreement to honor tickets between one of the cities in one of the pools, and another, much larger city.  This pool involved a railroad that was not part of either pool above.  Give the names of the two railroads, and the city pair.

I had forgotten about the Causeway street trackage.  Union Freight actually used a small piece of T track, connecting to a B&M spur during a reroute arond North Station construction in the last year or so of UFRR's operation.  I don't think the T and the spur connected directly before the reroute.

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Posted by daveklepper on Tuesday, July 10, 2018 11:01 AM

The NP, GN, and UP all honored each other's tickets Portland - Seattle.  Possibly the C&O, NYCentral, and PRR or B&O honored each others tickets Cincinnati - Detroit.

The NP, GN, and CB&Q obviously honored each other's tickets Mineeapolis - Saint Paul.   The Soo probably had an agreement with the CB&Q St. Paul - Chicago.

I did not know about the Union Freight rerout.  Before that there was no usable conection at the location, but there was interlaced trackage.  The streetcar tracks 1935 and before hosted Eastern Massachustts cars to and from the Brattle Street Loop in the Subway, Scolley Square Station complex, to Woodlawn, Revere Beach via Revere Street, Revere Beach via Beach Street, Revere Carhouse, Lynn, Salem, and Newbaryport, as well as Boston Elevated cars to Sullivan Square via Main Street and via Bunker Hill Street.  In 1936, the Revere lines became Boston Elevated lines and were rerouted to connect with the East Boston rapid transit line, now Blue Line, at Maverick, via Meridian Street.  Woodlawn was run as BE streetcar for about a year, just betwen Chelsea and Woodlawn, before it became a BE bus line, with tracks retained to the main Eastern Massachustts shop for prepairing cars for sale and for overhaul for the remianing two Quincy EM lines and Stonleham, reached via BE, then MTA tracks,  The other EM lines became bus via the Sumner Tunnel, later some via the Mystic River Bridge.

The Main Street line with its Causeway Street ttackage, was kept as a service connection as you noted, when the Main Street and Bunker Hill Street lines went to bus.  But the buses (also the Eastern Mass buses) only went as far into downtown as Haymarket Square, not as far as Scolley.  So the MTA ran a one-car North Station - Haymarket - Scolley/Battle St, Type 5 nickle-fare shuttle car each weekday frolm the beinning of the morning rush to the end of the evening rush.  The car came from Salem Street (on the Elm Street Fellsway line) car house for some reason and carried pasengers on its entir put-in and pull-out runs, and I rode the latter twice.   At North Station, the operator left his post and collected an addional nickle from each passenger.

I assume the two Charlestown lins had also been based at Salem Street and will check on that.   That could be the reason for the shuttle being based there.  I was an MIT student during the period.  Bill Kenney, a fellow railfan met at NRHS meetins and motorman on the Main Line Elevated (Orange Line now) had told me about the Salem Street Carhouse - Shuttle operation.

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Posted by rcdrye on Tuesday, July 10, 2018 11:34 AM

You have one of the lines involved in the optional honoring arrangement.  The other was not one of the Hill lines.  Tickets were honored between two cities on one lake, and two on another, plus a couple of points where both railroads had a presence. One of the railroads reached one of the endpoint cities via a short connection.

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Posted by NP Eddie on Tuesday, July 10, 2018 5:26 PM

Rob and All:

As information, (regarding Minneapolis to St. Paul), if you departed from the MILW depot in Minneapolis, you needed a MILW ticket. If you departed from the GN depot, you needed a GN ticket. The Minneapolis/St. Paul-Twin Ports market did have a "pool" agreement, which from 1967 onward was on GN trains only. I never heard of the CBQ honoring SOO line tickets from St. Paul to Chicago unless they were interlined at St. Paul to Chicago.

I always enjoy the information on this forum.

Ed Burns 

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Posted by rcdrye on Wednesday, July 11, 2018 8:05 AM

Last I remember St. Paul wasn't a lake port...

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Posted by daveklepper on Wednesday, July 11, 2018 10:29 PM
Ed, you are in a better position to get the answer than I am; I was really just guessing. And how did the operation go and how is your health?
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Posted by NP Eddie on Wednesday, July 11, 2018 10:45 PM

Dave and Rob:

I was only giving information about the east of St. Paul operation. I will e-mail Dave shortly.

Ed Burns

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