Paul - you're up!
If Paul (CSSHegewisch) wants to replace this with his own question, he's welcome to do so.
Of the PRR's 20+ daily departures from Chicago Union Station the 1950s and 1960s, this was the only one whose gate announcement included the phrase "The Pennsy welcomes you aboard!"
Either the Detroit Arrow (operated with the WAbash via Fort Wayne) or the Trailblazer, coach streamliner to NY.
rcdryeOf the PRR's 20+ daily departures from Chicago Union Station the 1950s and 1960s, this was the only one whose gate announcement included the phrase "The Pennsy welcomes you aboard!"
Both the Trailblazer and the Detroit Arrow were gone by the mid-1960s. This train retained its name, but not the announcement, into the Penn Central era.
The Pennsylvania Limites?
Johnny
You said daily, and the only two Chicago PC named trains were the Broadway and the Floirda train. The latter was every other day, not daily. So the Broadway is it.
Pennsy tried really hard to keep the Broadway all-Pullman, keeping it so almost a decade after coaches were added to the 20th Century. Even the coaches finally added were ex-UP 44-seat coaches with substantial lounges, which PRR bought just before the PC merger. Technically the Broadway stayed all-Pullman, as it was "combined" with the General, a fiction that was dropped almost immediately. A measure of PRR's pride was the special gate announcement at Chicago Union Station.
Remember this history very well. But my usual procedure was to go westbound onh the Broadway, then back on the replacement for the Century, the "Steel Fleet" as we called it. This was the opposite of my first trip, around 1959, west on the Century and back on the Boadway when both were all-Pullman. Had forgotton about the special announcement. The last time I rode the Broadway was four days before train-off, and then only from Lancaster to New York, on a round-trip Harrsiburg ticket so I could return on the Broadway. (Work on the Fulton Opera House restoration) The Amtrak condouctor told me some railfan friends, four fellow Branford members, were sharing two interconnected bedrooms in one of the two Heritage sleepers, and I could ride with them. But most of the Philly-NY portion was in the dining car. The food service remained excellent to the end.
My question, name all the features of the original IC-suburban mu cars that made them different from any other railroad-owned and operated fleet of electric mu cars. Two features and only two were shared with the South Shore cars and only with the steel South Shore cars. Others were unique to the IC alone.
By unique, I am referring to the pre-WWII period --- althouhg come to think of it one or two of the other charactersitics, not on the South Shore, was shared with the B&O's Staten Island Rapid Transit, but that is a good question as to whether or not that is direct railroad ownership.
IC's (and CSS&SB's) MUs had electropneumatic brakes and fully automatic Tomlinson couplers that made all connections. NOT shared with CSS&SB were non-trap vestibles (with air doors) that required high-level platforms at all times.
South Shore's Insull MU cars did not have Tomlinson couplers. Also, the IC MU cars did have an emergency trap in one of the vestibules.
You're certainly the one to catch me out. What IC MU's lacked were the step wells. The new NICTD cars do have Tomlinsons. The old ones also had hoses on the end, so -- no fully automatics.
air doors and non-trap vestibules are correct and not shared with South Shore. Two items are shared, and not on any other RR-owned mu's, and one is obvious from pictures, and one is a result of the operating environment on both railroads. Then there is one item peculiar pre-WWII to the IC, but standard on rapid transit equipment and on most post-WWII electrical mu's.
All or most of IC 1st generation mu's were motor-trailer pairs, with the trailers seeing some steam hauled service before electrification, but equipped for the electrication,with controls at one end. At the other end was the one vestibule with traps and steps on the two-car unit. This was for emergency and crew use.
So, let us have the remaining three, please.
CANNOT YOU LOOK AT MU PHOTOS AND COME UP WITH TWO OF THE THREE ANSWERS? HINT, SEEN BETTER IN FRONT VIEWS BUT ALSO SEEN IN SIDE VIEWS.
AND THE UNIQUE OPERATING ENVIRONMENT OF THE SOUTH SHORE AND IC ELECTRIC? SHOULD BE EASY.
IN PASSING, I SHOULD NOTE THAT THE IC SUBURBAN WENT HIGH-PLATFORM WELL BEFORE ELECTRIFICATION!!!
HAVE MOST OR ALL THE WOOD HIGH PLATFORMS BEEN REPLACED WITH CONCRETE?
Surely 1500VDC overhead isn't one of these, but I'll throw it in.
I may need to find more books... All I could come up with was the use of roller bearings, copper bearing steel (pre CorTen) and aluminum components and plates, at least on the later cars. They were also among the first railroad vehicles of any kind with safety glass in the operators' windows. One last thing - like all IC commuter cars until the most recent Metra Electric batch they had no bathrooms!
PC-10 control (Pneumatic Cam) and a new type of motor for 1500V operation.
Metra continues to upgrade ex-IC stations, but some of the platforms are still at least partly wood.
RC, you got three answers, Tomlinsons, sliding doors, and not-trap vestibules, so I think you should provide the next question. But yes, I was looking for 1500V DC. An IC exclisve, prewar, except for B&O's SIRT, which should be considered rapid transit anyway, also with sliding doors and no traps or steps, were pantograph gates to prevent people on high platforms from trying to enter between cars. But South Shore did not have them. But did share diaphragms between cars, which no other RR electric mu's had.
When this train was streamlined before World War II, a section serving a third city that had been part of the train's operation since 1909 was replaced with a new through train that ran all the way to the common endpoint. This new train wasn't fully streamlined until after WWII. Train names, and railroad.
Very very easy to answer. 20th Century Limited, had Boston section until streamlined in 1938. The new train was the New England States, Chicago - Boston, at first all heavyweight Pullman-only, sreamlined after WWII with Budd equipment, and coaches added.
I would have been very disappointed if it had taken long to answer. The New England States did get some lightweight cars from New York Central's 1939-1942 purchase of lightweight sleepers of various types before its own Budd equipment was delivered in 1948. The train lost its all-Pullman status by 1951 and was discontinued entirely in 1967, by which time it had become a maid-of-all-work train west of Albany. At least during its earlier years as a separate train it bypassed Albany Union Station to avoid an awkward backup move, changing crews near the site of the present Amtrak staion in Rennsalaer.
Your question, Dave!
Also, like the Century, at first if bypassed Cleveland Union, changing crews of course at Collingwood like the Century. As far as I know the streamlined version of 1948 never ran scheduled behind steam, and introduced passenger diesels to the Boston and Albany, the E-7s running through Chicago-Boston. In its last years it carried cars to Boston from Chicago both via Toledo and via Detroit, from Cincinnati, St. Louis, and Toronto. Sleepercoaches ran to Chicago and for a short time to Detroit.
A grouop of New England street-and-interurban railway executives planned on using a special parlor-like car for a Boston-New York streetcar trip.
Whose car, its name, and what was the car used for most of the time, a technical use?
Which city did they stay in overnight?
Why did they need to change cars at that city?
Which car did they change to and where can it be found today?
Where was the New York termination of the excursion?
Describe the rout.
Members of the Boston Street Railway Association have the facts right at hand. The New York papers made it seem as if there had been no change of cars, incidentally.
The initial car was owned by a University, for a specific technical purpose covered at one time or another most of the connecting New England streetcar and interurban lines. The second car still exists and is under repair currently. I rode it and once moved it into a carbarn. The overnight stopover was in New Haven. Enough hints for someone to come up with the rest of the answers?
I meant to look this up last night. If it's the trip I think I remember, it used the Shore Fast line between New London and New Haven, which was 1200V.
Either the initial car was equipped for the line or it went via a different rout, because the swap of cars was done in New Haven, on the advice of the Connecticut Company's New Haven Superintendent who gave the reason the original car could not make it to New York. And New Haven - New York was all 550-600V, vic Connecticut Company, New York and Stamford, and Third Avenue Railway (including Westchester Traction and Union Railway paper subsidiaries).
I believe the orinating car, owned by a University, could run either on 600 or 1200 volts. The second car was not so equpped, and is not today, under repair, wiith restoration assured. I not only moved the second car once into a carbarn but also had meals on it while riding.
I'm not sure the excursion I have is the one you were thinking of. Here's from CERA Bulletin 139 The Shore Line Electric Railway Company (2007) by O.R. Cummings pg 95 and 96.:
The start of New London-Old Saybrook service resulted in the creation of a new trolley route between Boston and New York (via Providence, Norwich, New London, New Haven, Bridgeport and Stamford) and such was publicized in August 1914 when a special car of the Bay State Street Railway carried a group of Massachusetts newspapermen from the Hub to New Rochelle, N.Y. The care, No. 4182, a double truck semi-convertible built by the Laconia (N.H.) Car Company the previous year, left Boston's Park Square at 8 a.m. on Monday, August 17, and reached New London at 5:45 p.m. After spending the night in the Hotel Mohican, the Fourth Estaters left New London at 8:55 on the morning of the 18th and arrived in New Rochelle in the late afternoon. Here they changed to a fast electric train of the New York, Westchester & Boston Railway, which reached the 133rd Street Station at the Harlem River at 6:45. From this point it was only a short elevated railray trip to Manhattan.
The next morning, a party of Manhattan and Brooklyn newsmen boarded a NYW&B train at 133rd Street at 8:30 and reached New Rochelle about 40 minutes later. Here No. 4182 was waiting to convey them to Boston, which they reached shortly after 6 P.M. on the 20th after an overnight stay in New London. The trolley was fitted out for the trip by removing its reversible transverse seats and replacing them with 10 wicker chairs. Plenty of edibles and potables were aboard when the car left Boston and these undoubtedly were replenished before the departure from New Rochelle on the return trip.
According to the Street Railway Bulletin, the Boston to New York trip had a running time of 20 hrs. 15 mins., including 9 hrs. 40 mins. from Park Square to New London. No. 4182 traveled over the tracks of the Boston Elevated Railway, the Bay State, the Rhode Island Company, the Shore Line Electric Railway, the Connecticut Company, the New York and Stamford Railway and the Westchester Electric Railroad. It's likely the trolley overhead between Flanders Corner and New Haven was temporarily energized at 600 volts while car 4182 was en route between these points as otherwise it would have had to be towed by a Shore Line car for more than 45 miles. Newspaper reports of the trip do not mention any such tow.
Bay State car 4175 from the same series is nearing the final stages of restoration at the Seashore Trolley Museum in Maine.
http://trolleymuseum.org/collection/browse.php?id=04175SMA
4200s and 4300s continued to be used on Eastern Mass lines to Stonham and Quuincy into the post-WWII period, with some sold to Boston El and then MTA for Chelsea and Revere service used to 1918.
I will say you have won with your posting. I was looking for anothe trip around the same time. The car used was not the Worcester Polytech "Test CAr," as I thought, but the parlor of the Springfield - Worcester line, and the reason it could not run west (south) of New Haven was a low overpass in Norwalk. So they switched to Connecticut 500, since 1947 at the Branford Electric Railway/Shore Line Trolley Museum. At New Rochelle, they did not switch to the NYW&B, but continued ini 500 through the Bronx and across the 3rd Avenue Bridge to the most southern point reachable by trolley wire, the loop adjacent to the 3rd Avenue and 129th Street carhouse, in Manhattan. They did not return as a group, and most probably went by by rail.
We'll stick with long-haul trolley riding. It appears from the story about the trips from Boston to New York that the key requirement for making one of these trips was sufficient food and (especially) drink, mostly of the anesthetic kind...
At one time it was possible to ride by trolley from Waterville Maine to Elkhart Lake Wisconsin, with just two small gaps, one of which was crossed on something owned by the interurban. What were the gaps, and how were they crossed?
Some notes here: Because the North Shore operated over the L in Chicago, it was necessary to climb stairs at one of several possible transfer points. Because there were also several physical links between Chicago Surface Lines and Chicago Rapid Transit, Chicago is NOT one of the gap locations. The South Shore line would certainly have made the trip quicker, but it was possible to get from South Bend to Chicago without using it. A third rail line is included, but since one of its cars once went to the Kentucky Derby, it doesn't count as a gap.
Beofore I try to look up the answer, should note that it may be possible to run a 600V car on 1200 vollts if one is careful! First, one should test the insulation to ground of all power electrical connections to insure that shorts or fires won't occur at double the normal volts. Then simply operate the car as if it has only a four-point K-type controller instead of an eight-point, never going beyond full series into parallel, and in insuring that the car has reached its maximum possible speed at points 1, 2, and 3, before moving the controller to the next point. Obviously don't attempt to climb a steep grade this way, don't use the electric lights but rely on oil lamps, possibly rely only on the hand-brake so the compressor can be shut off, but you can get the car over the line this way if the line is reasonably level.
No different from running a two-motor car with one motor cut out. The big problem is slipping in first point - that's where the amperage draw would be greatest, and having 1200V makes blowing out an arc harder. You also need to make sure all of the lights are turned off or disconnected - not always easy (esp. in a Laconia-built car from that era!) - so that the bulbs won't get 240V across them. On the other hand many 1200V lines used pairs of 600V rotary converters in series since they were readily available from both GE and Westinghouse and could be used in either a 600V or a 1200V substation. Cutting out one of the rotary converters in a substation wouldn't take much work, and there were only three substations on the Shore Line's 1200V section. Regular traffic could still run as all of the Shore Line's cars were perfectly happy on 600V.
Note on 1500V - both Piedmont and Northern and Milwaukee Road's isolated switching operation in Great Falls, Montana predated IC's 1500V electrification.
Yes, the Shore Line cars were equipped for two-voltage operation and used Connecticut Co. 600V trolley wire within its terminal citiies.
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