Richmond Broad Street it is. After SAL trains moved to Broad St in the early 1950s. SAL trains backed out southbound and in northbound (and RF&P connections for same left "wrong way" northbound) because of the way the tracks connected. Your question next.
In a certain city, a railroad station was on the "cross main street" (it crossed The main street at a 90 degree angle). Because the railroad crossed the "cross main street," the crossing was often blocked as passenger cars were shifted on trains. About fifty years ago, the station was moved north to be on The main street, and the tracks at the original station were elevated. Now, plans are in the works to again locate the station near its previous location. What is the city? If you can, name the two streets.
Johnny
I'll narrow the location area a bit--the city is in a southern state.
Johnny, this question really has me puzzled. The only thing I know is it's a southern city that must still have passenger service since you mention there are plans afoot to relocate the station. I've wracked my meager memory and spent several hours googling (without success I might add) in an attempt to find a city where the tracks were elevated about 50 years ago. I'll keep trying but unless I have a brainstorm or get lucky on the internet I'll just have to wait for someone else to identifiy the city or you post additional clues that will get me on the right track.
Mark
Is this the new "Union Station" proposed for Raleigh NC?
No, Raleigh is not the city I have in mind.
Savannah Ga Union station was replaced by the current Savannah station in 1962. No line elevations, but it did front on what was then Broad St.
Charleston has something underway to renovate the North Charleston Station in what may be a different location from the current one.
I "think" it's Columbia, South Carolina. Something's nudging me to suggest this as an answer.
No, it is not Columbia, Savannah, Charleston, or Raleigh. One of you has the right state.
As to Savannah, the old union station was a stub station, I believe. Service into all the stations in Charleston was stopped in the fifties, at the latest.
Could it be Durham, NC, which has had passenger service restored recently after Southern abandoned its last passenger service several years before Amtrak? Now there is NC-supported three-times daily each way service from Raleigh to Charlotte through Durham, with one each way continuing to Selma, Petersburg, Richmond, DC, and NYC.
I rode the Southern's NYC-Raleigh sleeper once. Through Durham.
Dave, it is not Durham.
The sleeper was switched from the mainline train to the branchline train at Greensboro, I think. Could that be the location?
No, Dave, it was not Greensboro (back about 1980, Amtrak stopped using the station in Greensboro and began using a facility at Pomona (calling it Greensboro)--and came back to a refurbished Greensboro station several years ago). I may be wrong, but I do not think that switching sleepers for/from Greensboro, Raleigh, Winston-Salem, and Asheville involved blocking a main street.
Just passing by---but sounds like Memphis, although Calhoun/Patterson questionable "main" street. Elevated, yes, but not in sense of Chicago, NYC or Philly
No, it is definitely not Memphis--there has been no change in the location of the IC station (the only one in use now) in Memphis.
Got there in 1969, "Urban Renewal" had raised hob with that area and laid waste to most of it, It was a long time ('90s) before restoration of the station was accomplished for other use, although AMTRAC remains a resident. Left MEM in '06, so have no current knowledge..
Off thread--but may be of interest---in mid-'70s, street cars came back to Main St with a loop-around along the river. On the streets, the motorman would "ding-ding" his bell at intersections, but as the river section is on IC tracks, instead of the bell, it was ---- ---- o ---- on a loud horn and all crossing gates came down --just like for real trains.
I just walked through last winter's Amtrak timetable to check all active stations in NC, SC and GA (you said one of those is right). The only station that comes even close (and there's no mention of track elevation) is Charlotte NC, but that involves a move from an SR facility north of town to a block bounded by 4th, Trade and Graham. My aeriel photo training doesn't make any of those, except maybe Trade, a main street.
We have a winner! I do not remember the date of the move, but until some time in the early sixties, the Southern station in Charlotte was on West Trade Street (which carries much more traffic than the parallel streets)--and the tracks crossed Trade at grade, necessitating stopping street traffic whenever a train or cut of cars moved across the street). The move was to a Southern facility on North Tryon (Tryon is The main street), along with elevating the tracks at Trade. Now, there are plans to consolidate bus and passenger rail facilities in one location--which is on Trade Street, at the former location of the Southern station. I understand it will take about fifteen or more years to bring these plans to fruition.
Back in my time (I grew up about fifty miles south of Charlotte), the bus station was about two blocks SE of the Southern station, on Trade Street. Currently, the bus (Greyhound) station is where the Southern station was.
And I was only complaining I couldn't find anything on it... NCDOT is claiming the new station will be ready by 2015, and serve 500,000 passenger annually ( http://www.bytrain.org/istation/icharlotte.html )
This MP sleeping car route operated overnight. It was handed off southbound in a different city than northbound, and to a subsidiary company southbound, and accepted from the parent company northbound. Name the endpoints, the handoff cities, and the parent and subsidiary. (This should be easy for some of you...)
Rcd, I was citing what I remembered from a post by PhoebeVet (who, I believe, lives in Charlotte) to a thread on a Trains Magazine forum. I hope that the NCDOT is right in its claim.
As to the sleeper line, it is so easy that I will not answer it, unless no one else can figure it out. Incidentally, I have slept on the two other roads' portions of the route--I did not get to sleep until long after I left the southern terminus of the sleeper I was in, and woke as we were leaving the northern terminus of the the parent company's portion of the route, having slept across two states on the parent company.
This is in the category of WAG'ing St Louis-Mexico City? Handoff's SB Nuevo Laredo , Tampico, Mexico & NB Laredo, Tx?
Rgds IGN
Not quite Mexico. This was MP-only (no IGN, NOT&M or Stl B&M) with the other carriers. Only thee states were involved southbound, though the northbound handoff came very close to touching another state.
rcdrye Not quite Mexico. This was MP-only (no IGN, NOT&M or Stl B&M) with the other carriers. Only thee states were involved southbound, though the northbound handoff came very close to touching another state.
As to "very close to touching another state," the car did travel in another state, traveling in four states on the way back home (if you have a copy of the SPV atlas for that state, you can check this--and I slept across that state).
Good catch. I was looking at a station list on a condensed timetable and didn't look at the map.
It's two and a half days since anyone has even guessed at the route of the sleeper. It ran between St. Louis and Shreveport. Southbound, the MP turned it over to the L&A at Hope, Arkansas, and it traveled on the Shreveporter to Shreveport via Minden. Northbound, the KCS carried the car on the Flying Crow to Texarkana and delivered it to the MP there.
Going from New Orleans to Kansas City in 1968, I slept on the Minden to Shreveport section of this route--Hope to Minden no longer had passenger service--and I continued sleeping on the Shreveport to Texarkana section of the return trip; I slept across Arkansas and Texas, waking up as we were leaving Texarkana--I had not gone to sleep until after we crossed the Mississippi at Baton Rouge.
New question: from 1947 into 1953, the PRR train which carried the Southerner (all coach on the Southern) from Washington to New York also carried sleepers from another Southern train. What was the other Southern train (it ran as a name train northbound only)?
rcdrye This MP sleeping car route operated overnight. It was handed off southbound in a different city than northbound, and to a subsidiary company southbound, and accepted from the parent company northbound. Name the endpoints, the handoff cities, and the parent and subsidiary. (This should be easy for some of you...)
I was thrown off by the wording of this question and possibly others were also. I interpreted subsidiary company to be a subsidiary of the MoPac and parent company to be the MoPac itself.
My apologies. I knew that was a risk in the question, and missed the chance to make it completely clear.
KCSfan rcdrye This MP sleeping car route operated overnight. It was handed off southbound in a different city than northbound, and to a subsidiary company southbound, and accepted from the parent company northbound. Name the endpoints, the handoff cities, and the parent and subsidiary. (This should be easy for some of you...) I was thrown off by the wording of this question and possibly others were also. I interpreted subsidiary company to be a subsidiary of the MoPac and parent company to be the MoPac itself. Mark
As to the mystery train in my question, Its entire run began at a station stop the Sounerner made.
Is the train in question the "New Yorker"? (From Atlanta)
rcdrye Is the train in question the "New Yorker"? (From Atlanta)
You must have edited your reply after first sending it, since Peach Queen was the name shown in the reply that came by email. The Peach Queen, which ran in both directions until the late sixties, shared PRR trains with the Pelican--running later sb and earlier nb than the Southerner.
The New Yorker (#40) gave business travelers the opportunity to have Pullman accomodations to Washington and New York after working a full day in Atlanta. This train left Atlanta an hour and a half ahead of the Southerner, and arrived in Washington fifteen minutes earlier. After the Crescent received its lightweight observation cars, its 2 DR, 3 C Observation-lounge cars were carried NY to Atlanta on the Peach Queen and north on the New Yorker. Apparently the other Atlanta-New York cars and the Atlanta-Washington car were also carried south on the Peach Queen. As well as I can tell, the Southern added a New York-Birmingham sleeper to the Southerner by December of 1952. #39 # 39 remained a mail train south of Greensboro.
In August, 1953, Southern discontinued many trains, including 39 and 40 Washington-Atlanta and Birmingham Division 39 and 40 (which had a through Atlanta-Memphis sleeper in conjunction with the Frisco).
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