Those would be the classification and marker lights, they are green, white and red.
Green - Following Section
White - Extra Train (Not on Timetable)
Red - marker for when cab is on the end of the train
.
Thank you all for your answers.
Kootenay Central Class lights, another interesting part of railwaying now gone by the wayside. Ditto the applicable whistle signals pertaining to the display and acknowledgement of green class lights and green flags. Ditto the disappearance of switch stand and yard limit lamps, cabooses and their markers, most semaphores, telegraph, train orders. The list goes on.
Class lights, another interesting part of railwaying now gone by the wayside.
Ditto the applicable whistle signals pertaining to the display and acknowledgement of green class lights and green flags.
Ditto the disappearance of switch stand and yard limit lamps, cabooses and their markers, most semaphores, telegraph, train orders.
The list goes on.
Amen, Brother.
AgentKid
So shovel the coal, let this rattler roll.
"A Train is a Place Going Somewhere" CP Rail Public Timetable
"O. S. Irricana"
. . . __ . ______
Yes, forty and more years ago, train and engine crews’ ability, or disability, could make a great difference in how fast a train would get over the road without causing interference with other trains. Many knew what must be done, what must not be done, and what could be done–and there were those who could not handle any situation that the rule book did not cover.
With all due respect to you good operating personnel who read this (I know you are good, else you would not be here), there is the story of the conductor and the carload of mules. I have told this to two retired dispatchers, one UP and one CN (I met him when going from Toronto to Jasper on the Canadian), and both appreciated it. Apparently they had had to deal with such a conductor.
The story is told by a dispatcher in Ashland, Ky. One day, the Lexington division DS had a message from a certain conductor, stating that he had a carload of mules and the mules had kicked a board off the side of the car, and asking, "What must I do?" The DS had other things to worry about, but he knew that this particular conductor was helpless. So he sent the message back (by telegraph) that the conductor should get a hatchet and some nails and put the board back on. Some time later, he had another message from the same conductor, sent from another station, stating that the mules had kicked the board off again, and one mule had his leg outside the car–and the same question. This time, the DS was a little bit short, and answered, "Get that carload of mules in here any way you can, and we will make conductors of them."
A few days later, the DS had a message to see the superintendent in his office. When he went in, he saw the conductor, and the superintendent told him that the conductor claimed that the DS had called him a jackass. Well, the DS managed to soothe the conductor’s feelings, and when the conductor left, the superintendent burst out laughing–he knew that conductor’s capabilities.
The moral of this story is that you should always know how to get a mule’s leg back inside the car.
Johnny
Hello Kootenay and Johnny,
I guess to fully answer cpbloom's question about why the CP engines he sees in the US have three class lights per side as opposed to the US style of one per side needs a bit more elaboration. Right up to the end of the class light era in the US there never was a requirement to use a three light system as both red and green colours could be shown as described above. The three light system with separate bulbs and on/off switches became a Canadian Transport Commission (CTC), or whatever it became, requirement as a result of a wreck in Canada in the late sixties. Thus all engines built after that for use here had the three light system, and with diesels roaming far and wide from their original homes, now you could see one of these units almost anywhere. There was a great example of this on a shortline owned MLW/ALCO on the cover of Trains a year or so ago.
P. S. Great story about the mules.
You know, lots of guys would be afraid to display their ignorance about something like this, but not me. Why is this called "a 'red barn' question"?
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