If so this might be the only muni subway to have freight service.
There was a freight "subway" in Chicago. It had nothing to do with a people transit subway. It was called the "Chicago Tunnel Company" and it was not your typical sort of an operation.
MORE: http://blog.chicagodetours.com/2012/05/chicago%E2%80%99s-freight-tunnels-the-forgotten-underground/
The Route of the Broadway Lion The Largest Subway Layout in North Dakota.
Here there be cats. LIONS with CAMERAS
See the following
http://www.chicago-l.org/operations/freight/index.html
The Chicago Underground Railroad Company had no relation to the rapid transit system...
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CED137 See the following http://www.chicago-l.org/operations/freight/index.html
Now that the LION did not no about!
ROAR
A wonderful site! Somehow I never made it to that page while poking around it. Thanks for posting!
Did you know that the New York City Subway has it's own freight system called the "Work Train."
The Chicago Tunnel Company was a separate freight operation (2' gauge) that served the downtown area only. It was killed off by the development of local trucking and in later years survived by removing ash from the furnaces of various Loop office buildings.
The CRT/CTA operated a contract freight operation on the North Side Main from just south of Wilson Avenue to Howard Street. The service was operated on behalf of the Milwaukee Road, from whom the North Side Main was leased. Primary customers were a number of coal yards and the service ended in 1975.
alloboard Did you know that the New York City Subway has it's own freight system called the "Work Train."
More than that, the BMT *does* have freight operations.Now owned and operated by NYCT, The South Brooklyn Railway (SBK) serves the docks and warehouses along the south Brooklyn waterfront, and also does some street running in that area.
Here is one point where it connects with the subway system at 39th Street in Brooklyn:
In the photo above, I am standing on the 4th Avenue overpass. Behind me the West End line exits the 4th Avenue Tunnel and heads to the 9th Avenue station. In the distance the BQE is seen above 3rd Avenue, and THAT used to be the strtucture of the Third Avenue Elevated line. In the Photo below, I walked to 3rd Avenue, and took a picture looking east towards 4th Avenue. Beyond that fence in the distance are the active subway tracks of the West End line. The 4th Avenue line would be below these tracks.
Beyond the vantage point of my camera (I am standing on Second Avenue), the line joins the SBK running north and south on First Avenue and through other properties on the waterfront. Below, a Google view of the waterfront, note the boxcars west of 1st Ave near the waterfront.
As far as I know, any tracks south of 39th Street along the waterfront are actually owned by the Bush Terminal Railway and not South Brooklyn. As far as I know the only active customer remaining for SBK is the TA itself, and the SBK is kept as a freight subsidiary to get the rebait do as terminating carrier for delivery of new rolling stock and supplies. At the 39th St. pier I believe both Bush Terminal and SBK connect with Cross Harbor, which provides ferry service to Greenville, NJ, or did at one time. But Bush Terminal may also connect with the Bay Ridge ferry terminal served by New York and Atlantic, as well as Cross Harbor at teh 62md St. pier.. (There was talk of merging Cross Harbor and New York and Atlantic, but I did not hear of any talk of merging Bush Terminal into SBK.) The question in my mind is whether the SBK tracks west of 4th Avenue that connect to the Sea Beach tracks at 62nd Street are still usable and whether Cross Harbor can deliver to SBK there instead of at 39th Street. The "main line"of the NY&A is of course the old Bay Ridge LIRR branch used by NYNH&H trains to reach their ferry to the PRR in Greenville, NJ.
http://www.chicago-l.org/operations/freight/images/freight@montrose.jpg
Was in N side today ...had no idea that the puple line was orginaly a steam freight railroad
CTA interchanged with C&NW or MILW and brought coal (in regular interchange hoppers) to a coal yard on the north side as late as the 1960's-1970's when I lived there. I think the coal yard was the prototype for a coal yard kit that Walthers produced many years ago (long OOP). If memory serves me right, I think it was near the Bryn Mawr CTA station. There must be some Chicago area juice fans who can give you much better info on that. The Chicago photos that were posted showed the narrow gauge industrial RR that served stores in the Loop area. It had no affiliation with CTA as far as I know.
The Chicago & Evanston division of the CM&StP was leased by the Northwestern Elevated in 1908, with a three party arrangement that also allowed Chicago and Milwaukee Electric (Later North Shore Line) to go as far south as Church St in Evanston using NWERy overhead wire. Gauntlets were installed to allow freight cars ans steam locos to pass high-level platforms. During the teens and twenties the line was elevated and CM&StP contracted with NWERy to operate freight service from Buena Park (pronounced Bew-enna, just a bit south of Wilson) to Evanston. NWERy acquired a pair of freight engines for the service.
Fast forward through a bunch of coporate renames and Chicago Rapid Transit (CRT) and the now CMStP&P continued the arrangement, by this time amended to allow North Shore trains to get to the loop. CRT also used CNS&M's Skokie Valley line to interchange CMStP&P freight with CNS&M during WW II. Track one on the North Side main had overhead and gauntlets south of Granville, with overhead and no third rail north between Granville and Howard.
CTA took over the arrangement from CRT with the same two locomotives, Baldwin-Westinghouse S-104 and S-105. The third rail gap on track one was filled after traffic had dwindled to a few coal yards south of Granville, though cars were occasionally handled as far north as the team track at South Blvd. in Evanston. After the service was discontinued, the wire and gauntlet rails were removed. Only part of the ramp down to Buena Park and some odds and ends of track and maybe a pole or two remain.
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