Train lines in town

[super cheif n]

how many people here have train line that goes in and out of there town.(not including little passenger lines)

my town has like 1 main line going in and out it. hopefully one day i plan to do a module on my down town part with the movie theater as the main focus(n scale)

[NittanyLion]

There was once a time that my town had PRR-B&O diamonds, with the Bessemer & Lake Erie choosing to elevate their track over throat of the PRR yard, and a PRR-B&LE-B&O junction less than a quarter mile north of all that.  Conrail pulled up the PRR tracks in the late 80s.  Chessie sold off the B&O tracks to the Buffalo & Pittsburgh.  Despite being fairly busy, I never see any traffic personally.  There's a passing siding that runs along with main road into town, and crews drop entire trains there so they can run light to the B&P facilities a few miles north.  But all I ever see is a new train waiting for its power to come back.  B&LE is CN now, but CN seems to leave well enough alone.  They've even repainted some B&LE locomotives in their B&LE colors since the merger, so CN appears to not really care.  But its future is in some doubt right now, as B&P is almost finished with its own track into the AK Steel property.  AK Steel is the B&LE/CN's last customer, other than the coal facilities at the north and south ends of the line.

[MisterBeasley]

In Bedford, Massachusetts, we have a former rail line, last used as commuter rail but now abandoned and turned into the Minuteman Bikeway.  The original line, operated by the Middlesex Central Railroad, began operation in 1873.  Commuter rail service ended in 1977.

From the Bedford Depot area, there's an extension to Concord, Massachusetts, called the Reformatory Branch.  That was abandoned even earlier, and now exists only as an unpaved footpath, also used by mountain bikers.  (Motorized use is prohibited on both trails.)

In addition, there is yet another abandoned bed, from the narrow-gauge Bedford & Billerica Railroad.

For more info, check out the Depot Park web site:

http://www.bedforddepot.org/

 

[super cheif n]

sweet anymore people?

[Tjsingle]

Yea, I do. CSX's old main line, MARC/CSX near Jessup MD, and route 32, on the jessup line, there is a branch that goes to several industries in columbia.

ex conrail near Route  32 on jessup line

c

[carknocker1]

Where I currently live we have a secondary UP mainline that is mostly used by Amtrak .

The town I moved from in Southern Indiana , had NS, the Indiana Southern , and the Algiers , Winslow & Western , never a dull moment , plus I was not far from the CSX line .

[lvanhen]

I live in an urban area, and my town has ONE traffic light (if you don't count the one on a town border!)  We're also at the top of a pretty good hill 500'+!  The next town over has CSX (ex conrail ex ?) and very active NJTransit and a not very active NY Western & Susqeuhenna - or whatever they call it!!  They actually switch on a low trestle over the Passaic River & have a little street running in Garfield NJ, so it's pretty interesting.  When I was a kid, the Erie ran through the center of town - now NJTransit commuter, and the West Shore branch of the NYC ran on the west side of town where I lived - can still remember the steam whistles in the middle of the night!!!

[tomikawaTT]

My home city has a UP line (LA&SL) running right through the middle of it.  Most of the road/rail crossings are grade-separated (with work underway to separate the one nearest my humble abode) but there are still flat crossings, even in the middle of town.

The main problem with trying to model it wouldn't be the railroad itself.  It would be the towering line of casinos paralleling it, with all of their huge, garish signs.

One guess where I live...

Chuck (modeling Central Japan in September, 1964)

[jeffrey-wimberly]

Leesville, Louisiana has the KCS mainline going right through it. There's a small yard in the middle of town.

[kcole4001]

My town (Amherst, N.S.) sits on a bottleneck between two provinces. Through this route the CN line runs from a major seaport, Halifax, and travels to the rest of the Eastern part of the country. In fact, the Google Earth snapshot show a container freight heading north blocking traffic on the Victoria St. crossing, while the head end is well out on the marsh (N. America's largest salt marsh).

Container traffic is heavy, and there still is some VIA passenger service running from Halifax to Montreal.

Most of the rest of the province's rail line have been abandoned, some are now bike or snowmobile trails.

[wjstix]

My original home town (Richfield MN) had a line going thru it north-south roughly splitting the town in two halfs....it came up from the south through Bloomington but only went a few blocks into Minneapolis to serve some industries and ended there. (Originally the end of the line was in Richfield, but in the 1930's Richfield sold it's northern part to Minneapolis. So Richfield Hardware and Richfield Lutheran Church are in Minneapolis.)

[rs2mike]

Medina ohio has the wheeling and lake erie that runs through and does switching work at all the industries.  Spencer ohio(near medina) has the csx mainline double track that runs through it.

[jfallon]

  Virginia Beach had a branch line of the old Norfolk Southern running through almost to the oceanfront. Freight sevice was suspended about 8 years ago, but there is a light rail commuter train under construction on the Norfolk portion of the right-of-way. It was planned to run to the beach, but the locals voted it down in a fit of HUTA-NIMBYism. Of course, gas was only $1.00/gal back when they voted. I wonder how they would vote now!

  The Bay Coast RR has a line from the Little Creek carfloat yard into Norfolk which runs right on the border with Va. Beach. This line still sees at least one transfer run a day to NS.

                                                 John

[loathar]

Ex CSX branch line that was recently aquired by the TSRR. Runs from Nashville Tn. to Florence, Al.

 

[NS AS-416]

My city has both a BNSF main (ex CB&Q I think) and CP main (ex SOO) complete with yards and a diamond crossing between the yards. All about two to three miles from my current residence :-)

I know the C&NW also ran through town with a yard - passenger and freight - way back when along with at least two other RRs.

Matt

[Packers#1]

NS is all over around here. It's out by my city's recreation complex (citizen's park), and all downtown as well. there's one portion of line I'm going to model for my shortline, it's almost a tunnel, but the top is open to the air.

[Been Nothing Since Frisco (BNSF)]

Theres a BNSf mainline that runs throught town and Missouri and north Arkansas line that crosses BNSF but the MandA is very slow and very few train mabey fiver a MONTH if its buissy but if one comes throught it take longer than leagle time, yea and over 100 cars long most of the time but they go 10mph FOR CRYING PUT LOUD!!!!!!!! and it causes trafic to backup a long way, But the good news is I live on the other side of town and I don't have to deal with it very much.

[trainfan1221]

I have the former Erie Lackawanna (Erie) main line, now NJTransit's Bergen Main Line.  It is extremely busy with their passenger traffic, but freight except for locals is a thing of the past.

[Robby P.]

I have the best of both worlds.  Norfolk Sothern on one side of the river,and the other is CSX.  Theres a decent railyard in a town near me, but its all CSX .  I hear trains all day.  Somedays alot and then there are some days very few. 

[Johnnny_reb]

Ex CSX branch line that was recently aquired by the TSRR. Runs from Nashville Tn. to Florence, Al.

 

loather, you got anymore pictures of the loco? I like the paint scheme.

[NittanyLion]

Oh, I forgot to point out that in the glorious railroad past, the B&LE's largest customer in town and also on the whole line was a little operation called Standard Steel Car Company and a few decades later, Pullman Standard (and a few decades after that, Trinity).  I don't know if anyone has ever heard of them though.  They just tore down the last part of the once massive (and if local legend is to believed, largest building in the world pre-Pentagon) plant.

[larak]

We have one - the Hudson River west shore line has a long yard here on their main line.

There used to be three other railroads that originated/ended here:

the Ulster & Delaware, the Walkill Valley and part of the Ontario & Western. Ah the good old days. 

You get to guess which town this is. Shouldn't be too difficult. 

[super cheif n]

sweet my town has a BNSF i think?

[CSXDixieLine]

Ex CSX branch line that was recently aquired by the TSRR. Runs from Nashville Tn. to Florence, Al.

Loathar, Sounds like you live near the town (or maybe in the town) I just saw on Food Network that has some killer soda shop/diner that looked like a "must see" for me. I know they showed a train going through town during the feature they did on the restaurant. I'd have to look it up to see where it was, especially since I may have to detour by there on my next jaunt through Nashville.

As for me, Lilburn, GA is at milepost SG555.0 on the CSX Abbeville Subdivision about 20 miles northeast of Atlanta. Decent amount of traffic, mostly manifests running between Hamlet, NC and Atlanta but also some autorack and intermodal and (rarely) unit coal as well. USELESS TRIVIA OF THE DAY: The milepost means we are exactly 555 miles from the start of the old Seaboard Air Line mainline in Richmond, VA, since that was milepost 0 and all of their lines numbering was based on that.

Jamie

[Jetrock]

Sacramento has several railroad lines, some of which are still in operation. The old Southern Pacific main line, originally constructed by Central Pacific for the original transcontinental railroad, is still in use and owned by Union Pacific; it runs along what used to be the northern edge of town, now it runs through the center of the city in several directions. The old Western Pacific main line, which runs straight through midtown Sacramento, was purchased by Union Pacific 20-25 years ago, although I see a lot of BNSF motive power on the WP main. The old Sacramento Valley Railroad's main line is currently in use as a Light Rail line along much of its length, except where it uses the Western Pacific alley route. Two other railroads, the Sacramento Northern and Central California Traction, used to have track in town but it has all been removed over the years, at least from Sacramento proper. Sacramento Southern, a SP branch line, is still partially in operation as a tourist line for the California State Railroad Museum.

[wm3798]

Just a schlumpy branch line where the Maryland & Delaware comes a callin' about two to three times a week.  At one time PRR, later PC.  Conrail didn't pick it up in '76, so the state owns the tracks now.

Lee

[eric719]

There are 3 lines running through my town. BNSF ex-Northern Pacific main. Union Pacific line from Hinkle, Oregon to Canadian border. Ex-Northern Pacific Central Washington branch now run by a shortline. Very busy place!

Eric
Cheney, WA

[NS2591]

The CN Flint sub gets about 30 trains or so a day, And the CSX Saginaw Sub gets about 4 a day Those of you that aren't all boned up on Michigan history(Probably most of you no offense) The CN Flint sub runs East and West, Thats for former GTW Line through Flint(Not the old main, the new Main) Used to be really busy back in oh say, probably early 70's. Trains Ga-freaking-lore, we used to have a ton of business here too until GM started to pull out, Same goes for the CSX. They used to get a lot of traffic on the North South Saginaw sub, Buick City(If any one here owns a buick older than I think like '96 Chances are it is was built there) But with the closure of that plant and so many others here, CSX has dwindled to about 4 or so a day, and the CN line, While being the main East West for CN between Toronto & Chicago, only gets maybe 30 on a good day, they are usually Infrequent but long, they tend to be 120 or more and the move, Trackspeed is 60(I think) from Port Huron to Durand, at Durand it drops to 45 becuase of the diamonds and then returns to 60 west of town(Again I believe thats what it is)

[johncolley]

One for sure is the south side of Modesto, CA where the SPUP goes down the San Joaquin Valley, the Santa Fe bypassed town completely on the east side, now a lot of tract homes there, and BNSF goes through like the proverbial bat! jc5729 John Colley, Port Townsend, WA

[ricktrains4824]

My little town has the B&P plus the Western NY & PA (ALCO HEAVEN!) crossing at diamond. Also not far from CSX and NS mains. (30 Mins. by car)