DART Red Line video Plano to Dallas

[CMStPnP]

First video is from the End of the Line in Plano to I-635 (LBJ Freeway) stop in Richardson.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mgNPsYEiZVc

 

Second Video is a continuation from I-635 in Richardson to Pearl Station which is a few stops short of Dallas Union Station.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3vFNx7Ltdxs

The white and black square signs with numerals on them above the W - whistle signs are the speed limit signs.    CP uses a different style and they are yellow and black on CP.    Plano, Tx Population: 250,000

[Electroliner 1935]

Horn blowing for Xings seems very short and only two toots. Starts about halfway from W sign to Xing. Different rules?

[Gramp]

Quite a tunnel. 
What railroad's ROW did Dart take over for this route?

[CMStPnP]

Gramp

Quite a tunnel. 
What railroad's ROW did Dart take over for this route?

Houston and Texas Central Railroad which later became, T&NO subsidiary in I think 1923 or so.   Southern Pacific.    Northern end of the ex-SP line that UP uses between Dallas and Houston.    It once stretched from Dennison, TX (Red River border) to Galveston, TX.    Last freight train on the full unabandoned route was sometime in the 1990's.    They abandoned most of the RoW North of Dallas and DART bought it.    The line North of McKinney is in place to Sherman and is still used by a short line which has trackage rights Sherman to Dennison.   Between Sherman and Dennison, rails are still in place but trees growing through the ties.  

The Tunnel you see in the video is not originally part of the ex-SP RoW but is all new creation of DART.   A bit before the line enters the North end of the Tunnel the ex-SP right of way veers off to the left and into a park I think.

A lot of the railroads entering Dallas, most notibly the T&P and MoPac had their rights of way on the city streets.    Pacific Avenue in Dallas is the former T&P and MoPac street running to their train station downtown prior to Dallas Union Station being built.   MKT had street running as well I believe.

[Gramp]

Interesting. Thx. 

[JPS1]

Gramp

 Quite a tunnel. 

What railroad's ROW did Dart take over for this route? 

I am writing this from memory, so I may not have all the facts correct.  CMStPnP is correct that a significant portion of the Red Line was laid on the former SP right of way.  It ran from south Dallas via White Rock Lake to a point just south of DART’s Forest Lane Station, which is where the Red Line picks it up. 

 

Off to the left, shortly after the train in the video departs Forest Lane, you can see where the former SP right-of-way diverts from the current line.  The old truss bridge that carries the northbound Red Line was an SP bridge.

 

From the divergence to Mockingbird Station the line was built from scratch for DART.  It parallels Central Expressway, which is to the right as the train heads for Mockingbird Station.  The Dallas to Sherman/Denison Interurban right-of-way ran along portions of what is now the expressway.  When it was abandoned, the roadway was laid done over most of it.  One of the Interurban cars can be seen in Plano.

 

Just before Mockingbird Station the Red line merges with the Blue Line in the cut.  The Blue Line runs from Rockwall through Garland to downtown Dallas and on to south Dallas.  A portion of the line from north of White Rock Lake to Mockingbird Station was the MKT’s main line into Dallas.  The MKT’s Texas Special ran over this line on its way to Dallas and San Antonio. 

 

The tunnel from Mockingbird Station to just north of the Pearl Street Station, which is 3.2 miles long, was not part of DART’s original plan.  The plan was to run the light rail on the old MKT right-of-way through the Park Cities to downtown.  But the folks in the Park Cities used their impressive political clout to force a change in the plan.  They did not want the light rail trains running through their back yard. 

 

Because of the Park Cities pushback, DART decided to tunnel under Central Expressway.  This led to DART hiring a new chief engineer, who had built much of Singapore’s rail system.  The tunnel increased the estimated cost of the light rail system significantly.

 

City Place is the only underground station on DART’s light rail station.  It is convenient to Uptown Dallas and the McKinney Avenue Streetcar.  Another underground station was planned for Knox Henderson, but DART never found the money to complete it.

 

From the Pearl Street the Red Line, as well as the other lines, run through downtown.  At the west end the Red line turns south and then eventually southwest through Oak Cliff to Westmoreland.  After crossing the Trinity River south of downtown, the Red Line runs over the former Santa Fe right-of-way that ran from Dallas to Cleburne.