It was unusual for an interurban to have a rotary snowplow but this one had two electric powered rotaries to buck the 10 ft drifts that often blocked its line through the snow belt. Its early promoters dubbed the line as The xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Route and this unusual moniker was used by the road for most of its existence.
What was the name and route of this interurban?
Mark
Are you referring to the Denver and Intermountain Railroad ("The Kite Line"?) from Denver to Golden?
John
rfpjohn Are you referring to the Denver and Intermountain Railroad ("The Kite Line"?) from Denver to Golden? John
No the road I have in mind was located far to the east of Colorado.
After posting my last reply I got to thinking I had never heard of the Denver & Intermountain being referred to as the Kite Line. Hopefully someone will satisfy my curiosity as to the origin of this nickname.
I have to say your questions lead to lots of fun wild goose chases. So far... The Beebe Syndicate lines around Rochester and Syracuse New York had three rotaries between them but no cool nickname. The predecessor lines that became Southern New York Railway had two, but no cool nickname. The Houghton County Traction Company that connected Calumet and Houghton MI (and other places), also had (one) electric rotary.
“This line became known as the 'Kite Route' because the outline of its path on a map left the appearance of a child’s kite. The tail of the kite extended out of Denver to the D & I Junction (also just west of Broomfield) where it split into two courses, one through Superior and Marshall (with a branch to Eldorado Springs) to Boulder and the other going to Boulder via Louisville. Boulder was the point of the kite and these two routes made the outline of its diamond.”
Before I research the nickname if any, was it the Jamestown Westfield and Northern?
daveklepper Before I research the nickname if any, was it the Jamestown Westfield and Northern?
No but it was a New York interurban. See my reply to Rob's answer.
Possibly the interurban connecting Saratoga Springs with Albany and/or Schenecdady and and called the Spa line?
daveklepper Possibly the interurban connecting Saratoga Springs with Albany and/or Schenecdady and and called the Spa line?
That's not the one Dave. You need to look a bit further west and south from that area.
KCSfan No but it was a New York interurban. See my reply to Rob's answer.
Your reply got lost somewhere --
rcdrye I have to say your questions lead to lots of fun wild goose chases. So far... The Beebe Syndicate lines around Rochester and Syracuse New York had three rotaries between them but no cool nickname. The predecessor lines that became Southern New York Railway had two, but no cool nickname. The Houghton County Traction Company that connected Calumet and Houghton MI (and other places), also had (one) electric rotary.
I can't find my earlier reply either but you have mentioned the interurban I am looking for. After passenger service ended the road continued to run freight behind electric motors until most of its trackage was abandoned and the wire came down. Switching service continued on the remnant of the line that was left at one of its end points using a Climax locomotive until the early 1950's. My sources differ as to whether just one or two Climaxes were operated. The road's nickname was derived from a series of novels written by a famed American author. All that's left is for you to specifically name the correct road and it's nickname.
Geneva Advertiser–Gazette, Jan. 31, 1905
Electric Road Makes Record
During the blizzard of last week, when railroad traffic generally was either hindered or altogether tied up, the cars of the Rochester & Eastern Rapid Railway, running between Rochester and Geneva via Canandaigua made schedule time and surprised patrons and competitors alike. The company maintains at large expense two double-end rotary snowplows and one stationary plow, which are able to keep the road open in the stormiest weather. Rotary plows operated by electricity are an innovation in this section, and the plows have attracted much attention during the recent storms. When the mighty rotary is dissipating a snow bank, the snow spurts in literal streams from the nostrils of the great black hulk of the plow and the picture resembles an enraged demon. It has become a maxim along the line of the Rochester & Eastern that no matter what the weather, you may set your watch by the big orange car.
http://home.roadrunner.com/~dgardner17/reimages/map_a_l.gif
The Southern New York Railway was the "Leatherstocking Route". I can't verify more than one Rotary for them, but that's probably due to my research limitations. SNY used a GE 40-ton electric and the Climax, later a couple of GE industrial switchers.
Wanswheel has the R&E Rapid with two rotaries (but no nickname). My books all circle around the R&ER which is why I missed it. This is NOT the same as the Rochester Syracuse and Eastern (despite Wikipedia), but a different line that operated to Canandaigua and Geneva. Both R&ER and RS&E operated at least briefly over the Rochester Subway.
rcdrye The Southern New York Railway was the "Leatherstocking Route". I can't verify more than one Rotary for them, but that's probably due to my research limitations. SNY used a GE 40-ton electric and the Climax, later a couple of GE industrial switchers.
Bingo - we have a winner. Light up a cigar Rob and shoot us another question. James Fenimore Cooper was the author of the Leatherstocking series of novels.
When this 600V line took over trackage from an abandoned 1200V line, the number of active tracks on this wide street was reduced from six to four.
Muni/Market Street?
Market Street had 4 tracks and all 600V. Cars that ran on Market Street got very close to the cars that ran on this street, at least for a few years.
Yeh, but none of the Market Street tracks was ever 1200V, and anyway, the street went from two cable and two horsecar, to just two 600V, to four 600V, to two 600V plus trackless, to two surface 600V, trackless, two subway light rail 600, two deep subway 750 third rail wide gauge.
But a street in Oakland went from 1200V Interurban plus 600V local streetcar to 600V Key system Bridge trains plus 600V local streetcar, but I forget the name of the street.
daveklepper But a street in Oakland went from 1200V Interurban plus 600V local streetcar to 600V Key system Bridge trains plus 600V local streetcar, but I forget the name of the street.
I'll accept that for an answer. Adeline St in Berkeley had Key System transbay and streetcar tracks, with SP's IER in the middle. Key's F transbay line was extended over SP's Shattuck Avenue line after IER was abandoned. Both Key transbay and IER trains ran to the Transbay Terminal at First and Mission in San Francisco, where both Market St. Railway and Muni streetcars off Market street looped.
In an interesting twist, today BART runs UNDER Adeline St. so cars on Market are again near the ones that run on Adeline St.. Adeie St is still noticeably wider than connecting streets.
A little misplaced and late info on the Southern New York. A little album published by William S. Young, called "Short -Line Odyssey" has a two page spread on the SNY. They did, indeed, have two Climaxes, #1 and #44, and Mr. Young also notes that the SNY used eight different forms of motive power on the three mile freight remnant. An electric locomotive, a former Lehigh and New England gas electric car, a camelback 0-6-0 loaned by the D&H, a small gas-mechanical unit, a storage battery locomotive, an oil-burning 0-6-0, an electric locomotive converted to gas-electric and two Climaxes. Also an 0-4-0T was bought but never used.
Adline Avenue in Berkeley, and my memory confused it with Oakland. But sometime before the four tracks on Market were reduced to two, this also happened on Adeline, and did not this happen before the local streetcar line was abandoned? It required changing the ears connecting the trolley wire to the span wires and/or brackets so that both trolley pole and pantograph operation was possible, but I think this was done. Correct me if I am mistaken on this.
My question: Cleveland's Transit Commissioner designed the principles (but not the detailed design) of the Peter Witt Streetcar. A true Peter Witt is always a two-man unidirectional streetcar, with a wide double or triple width front entrance, and the conductor seated just in front of a wide exit door, or between two narrower exit doors. The idea was to greatly speed up passenger loading and discharging. All riders could board without paying at the front entrance, with short distance riders staying in the forward half of the car and paying as they left, and longer distance riders paying as they passed the conductor and found seats in the rear portion. The front usually had "bowling alley" side seats, and the rear more comfortable cross seats. But many of these cars on nearliy all large systems were converted to one-man operation with pay-as-you-enter. So the name stuck to the door arrangement, even when fare collection was different. And this is the arrangement of most modern transit buses, and was for most PCC cars, which were usually single-end, also.
But there were four North American systems that had fleets (more than a sample or two) of double-end cars with the Peter-Witt door arrangement. One was the Third Avenue Railway Co., later Third Avenue Transit Sysstem, with its 75 "Huffliners," 551 built primarily by Brill and the remainder in TARS's 65th Street and 3rd Avenue shop, 1937-1938. They were assigned to the Broadway - 42nd Street line, which was converted to bus in December 1946. Some saw further service in Sao Paulo, Brazil, as single-end cars.
Name the three other systems. Which had the smallest fleet, small than that of TARS-TATS, and why did they buy the cars. What general type of car were they?
Which system had the largest fleet? Is it possible that the designers of the TARS knew these cars? How similar are they, and what are the differences?
Besides being double-ended, the system with a quantity somewhat greater than TARS had double-end Peter Witt cars that had a distinguishing feature from almost all other systems' Peter Witt cars. What was t his feature? They also had single-end cars with the Peter Witt door arrangement. Many!
Rob, Johnny, Dave, Myron, et all:
RE: North Coast Limited Stewardess/Nurse service.
I e-mailed Bill Kuebler, author of a book on the NCL about this service after 1966. He replied with a very informative e-mail. One chapter in his book deals with the "Sue's". One of the Claim Departments agents was a "Sue". I did not know her well as I talked to a man about personal injuries in the Track Department (I was Roadmaster's Clerk at the time.).
As I cannot attach his e-mail to this entry, please e-mail me with your address and I will forward his information to you.
Ed Burns
763-234-9306 enburns@fcomcast.net
I have to modify the question, in that the specific system which I thought had the smallest fleet of double-end cars with the Peter Witt door arrangement, actually had two fleets whcih could share the same routoes, but were not otherwise compatible and of very different design. The total of both types may have exceeded the 75 Huffliners of TARS.
If you know the three systems, name them and you can ask the next question. The other details can be filled in by others or by me eventually. Do you need more hints?
LA Transit Lines had a pair of 42" guage double-enders. Gary Railways had several, used mainly in shift-end operations for steel mills. BQT (Brooklyn) had fairly large fleet.
Conversion to one-man operation was fairly simple. Rear doors were converted to treadle operation, bowling alley seats were replaced with transverse seats and a farebox installed. Chicago had a series of "Sedans" converted for one-man operation, but they were never used.
I specifically excluded LA RAILWAYS (and LA Transit), which only had two, and Gary did not really have a fleet. You got one right. You know fhe other two; they are obvious, and shame on you for not mentioning them. Brooklyn's fleet was the largest, numbered in sequence from 8000 to 8565 or 8575, and it is certain that Slaughter Huff and his detail desiginers knew them very well when they designed TARS 551-625. All the Brooklyn double-end Peter Witt cars had center doors that were centered and opposite one another, and this was true of TARS's Brill sample, 551. But 552-625 had the center doors staggered by one window length, for greater overall structural rigidity, with slightly lighter weight, and supposedly better passenger flow. 551-600 were aluminium. 601-625 were Corten steel, with longitudinal ribs or corrigations in the lower side panels to make up for the thinness of the steel used. In Brooklyn, most of cars numbered above 8500 had a tunstyle installed at one end for speedier fare collection when made signle-end, but they were still used as double-end cars in emergencies with the opposite end employing a regular portable farebox. These were the prototypes for the single-end 6000-6199 Peter Wiits which came with turnstyles, as did the (single end) PCC's 1000-1099. Except for the Brooklyn PCC's all these cars, TARS and B&QT/BMT used Brill 77 trucks, except that TARS made their own version using parts from Brill or their suppliers and recycled parts from scrapped Brill maximium traction (one-motor) trucks. All cars mebtioned here and in the quesiton had four motors. The Brooklyn double-end Peter Witts made up more than half the totla Brookliyn streetcar fleet during and after WWII.
Put your thinking cap on and name the other two large systems with fleets. One had zero single-end cars of any type, except possibly something super deluxe at one time, and the other had a fleet of single- end Peter Witts (two fleets) much more numerous than the double-enders. On this system, only one line into the downtown area used double-end cars right after WWII, and it was actually a cut back of a long interurban line with a very musical sounding name that ran buses during WWII and after, or perhaps was just the car line that the particular interurban used to enter the city. Of course the double- enders were used on a variety of shuttle and feeder lines in the suburbs, and one line was the sole conection crossing large bridge to a town famous for air-quality problems. The double -Peter Witts were exclusive in providing community local service at the end of a very long line that used only single- end cars, and these double-enders had their own carbarn near the end of that line.
Incidentally, you were very very close to one of the two other systems. So close that you were effectively on top of it and/or underneath it.
You are obviously referring to Pittsburgh which had both high and low-floor cars, which were found in both single and double-ended versions. I think the interurban you're referring to is Charleroi (which actually went to Roscoe) and the other interurban line was Washington, where local service was provided by double-ended low-floor cars. While the traffic flow was essential Peter Witt, Pittsburgh Rys didn't refer to them that way.
The only system I can think of without single-ended cars of any type was Dallas, which doesn't come to mind for Peter Witt type cars.
rcdrye You are obviously referring to Pittsburgh which had both high and low-floor cars, which were found in both single and double-ended versions. I think the interurban you're referring to is Charleroi (which actually went to Roscoe) and the other interurban line was Washington, where local service was provided by double-ended low-floor cars. While the traffic flow was essential Peter Witt, Pittsburgh Rys didn't refer to them that way. The only system I can think of without single-ended cars of any type was Dallas, which doesn't come to mind for Peter Witt type cars.
rcdrye You are obviously referring to Pittsburgh which had both high and low-floor cars, which were found in both single and double-ended versions. I think the interurban you're referring to is Charleroi (which actually went to Roscoe) and the other interurban line was Washington, where local service was provided by double-ended low-floor cars. While the traffic flow was essential Peter Witt, Pittsburgh Rys didn't refer to them that way. BECAUSE ALL THEIR ROLLING STOCK WERE ONE-MAN PETER WITT CARS IN 1949. The only system I can think of without single-ended cars of any type was Dallas, which doesn't come to mind for Peter Witt type cars.
You are obviously referring to Pittsburgh which had both high and low-floor cars, which were found in both single and double-ended versions. I think the interurban you're referring to is Charleroi (which actually went to Roscoe) and the other interurban line was Washington, where local service was provided by double-ended low-floor cars. While the traffic flow was essential Peter Witt, Pittsburgh Rys didn't refer to them that way. BECAUSE ALL THEIR ROLLING STOCK WERE ONE-MAN PETER WITT CARS IN 1949.
Doubly ashamed of yourself, since I told you that you were very very close, even on top and under the system. OK, one last chance. All its double-end Peter Witt cars and almost all the rest of its passenger rolling stock were mu and often (usually?) ran in trains. it may have some special trailer single-end cars at one time, certainly not Peter Witt.
You did describe the Pittsburgh sitiuation, but the term low-floor has now referred to realliy low-cars, and I would rather say heavyweight and lightweight cars. But the real distinguishing feature of the Pittsbugh lightweight cars were their deck roofs. The only other lightweight deck roof cars, not Peter Wiits, were Atlanta's and Ottawa's.
In 1949 the only downtown line not using PCC's was the Evergreen line, running north of the city, double track and heavy service with no loop at the north end, where formerly the interurban continued on to Butler witih connections to Erie.
Donorra was the branch off of the Charlerei-Rosco line that crossed the river with double-end cars (usually two assigned.)
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