It looks like the majority of the track changes are complete in front of the Roanoke Railcam and the VMT camera. In all that work they went from 3 tracks at the west end and 4 tracks at the east end and after adding a fifth track between the first two, they then removed the 4th track and ended up with the same 3 tracks at the west end and just 4 tracks at the east end. And work often had to stop so that trains could be run on tracks that were in the middle of the work and even temporarily connected to new track that later went away. Logistics nightmare to do all that rearranging of tracks and keep the railroad in operation. Well done!
But there are now more crossovers between the various tracks and they are MUCH straighter.
I have lost the majority of the landmarks I was using to measure the speed of trains (two tall light poles that were on the former passenger platform and the signal towers and bridges that were just right of center). But relying on the lengths of certain types of cars I can tell that the maximum speeds through the area have gone from 15 MPH to over 20 MPH (I clocked 1 WB train at 25 MPH, but it slowed quickly). When Google Earth updates their images to include this new trackwork I will pick some new landmarks and measure the distances on the new track to get better estimates of speeds.
They apparently have some more work to do, as evidenced by the two portable toilets moved in last week and the office trailer is still there, as well as some construction equipment is still being parked in the area overnights.
There is one thing that has me wondering, though... In the last week 13 black 'items' have been lined up between the city street (Shenandoah Ave.) and the new electrical shanty, that look similar to an automotive service station's "free air" terminals. They seem to be about 4-feet tall and maybe a couple of feet square at the base, with some sort of elongated 'hood' at the top. Does anyone recognize what they are?
Semper Vaporo
Pkgs.
I have not been able to get it to download for a few days . I don`t know if it is the camera or my computer . RON
Working fine for me... I use the connection that runs Media Player and has the largest size and frame rate:
http://128.173.197.94:443/RRCmov
The browser version has not worked for me for a long time... but I thought it was because I have added a couple of Do-Not-Track add-ons to my browser and that has killed a lot of websites and confused many more that embed some YouTube videos in either NEW or Non-standard ways (some I can see, and some I can't !)
I just tried the small, lower frame rate Media Player connection and it won't complete the connection either... seems only the original set up works on my PC.
It took a crew of 5 men and a stake-bed truck with a boom crane nearly 2 hours to move one of the 13 black items from in front of the hotel cam to in view of the VMT cam... it is now sitting on the "street side" of some concrete traffic barricades just left of center in the VMT cam view.
I still cannot figure what they are.
SV,
I did some poking around on line and they appear to be concrete bases for signals.
Norm
I'm hoping some signaling will be put in. W/o signaling, it is tough to predict the arrival of a train. I hate just sitting there with no trains and not knowing IF there will be a train.
I was never able to see the signals during the day time, and even at night only the ones at the very west end were partially visible, but, yes, they did help too anticipate when a train might be coming from the east.
I note this morning that another of the "items" is missing from the Hotel cam view, but I can't see where it went. 11 left.
An another gone this AM. Four men picked it up and put it the bucket of the loader,and took it to where the first one is,only closer to the tracks.Interesting.
I look at the web cam two or three times each day. I was intrigued by the track alterations and was puzzled by the extra fifth line and then its disappearance. I understand that Amtrak will arrive in 2017 - looking forward to seeing a passenger train for a change - so I guessed the new alignments and longer switch overs were all towards preparation for that. I also believe there is a lot more work to be done between Roanoke and Washington DC but we wont be able to watch any of that.
Now the 'curiosities' sitting by the shed. They were reminiscent of the statues of Easter Island. but I am grateful for the suggestion that they are signal post bases. There were thirteen, now ten. So ten green bottles comes to mind......
Alan, Oliver & North Fork Railroad
https://www.buckfast.org.uk/
If you don't know where you are going, any road will take you there. Lewis Carroll English author & recreational mathematician (1832 - 1898)
Them thingys are a lot taller than I had estimated... I have finally seen several men around the ten that are left, and now I estimate them to be closer to 7-ft tall (or all those guys were midgets).
I have to say I still don't understand the mentality of these workers. They spend 99% of their time "wandering" aimlessly in random directions or standing someplace with their arms folded for several minutes and then they will saunter off in a random direction, only to stop in mid stride to turn and go some other direction. And nobody seems to move with any intent or purpose to their motion, just a slow, lazy, summer-day stroll. I don't mean to be insulting, but, for gosh sake's fella's, get some gumption to at least look like you are earning your pay.
In the closeup it looks like it may be a switch heater, but, heck, I've been known to be wrong before.
Thanks for the photo!
It explains the curved silvery pipe-like thing where the others are all still lined up.
As for their height, when there were all those "work" (and I use that term very loosely) men around the stash of the devices, the men were hidden behind the tops of the device when on the south side of them and one of them appeared to look UP at one of them when on the camera side of the group (I guess he could have been looking at the side the Wachovia building instead). When they installed the one under the bridge it appeared it was set in a hole, so that might make it a bit shorter.
A few weeks ago, near the east end of the scene, several pilings were driven into the ground along side the asphalt(?) public(?) parking area and the ballasted area of the tracks and a very short length of guard rail was installed on them separating the parking area and the tracks.
But I cannot figure out what it is guarding!
There is a switch heater at the east end of the guard rail, but it is in no wise protected by the guard rail.
They also installed concrete traffic barricades (the kind seen along long-term highway reconstruction) between the parking area and the new electronics shanty and there are presently two traffic cones with a yellow tape stretched between them, one cone at the end of the concrete barricades and the other at the guard rail about a quarter of the way from the west end; indicating that unauthorized vehicular traffic is forbidden beyond that point. I could guess that the guard rail is an attempt to keep people from going around the traffic cones by driving closer to the tracks, but I can't see that anyone intent on driving past that point would be put off by 2 traffic cones and some yellow tape, so the guard rail seems a bit of an overkill for that situation.
It could be a way to keep cars from getting near the tracks when backing out of the parking spaces, but I would expect a need to protect the switch heater, too, as well as the tracks to the east of the heater, but the guard rail is doesn’t extend that far east.
So, what's it for?
Anybody able to access this cam lately. It has been a couple of weeks (I think) since I was last able to view it.
Works for me in Windows Media Player.
Timed out from Firefox and IE-11
Never too old to have a happy childhood!
Norm: How do you access the cam using Windows Media Player?
Typical cornpataters!
I tried it using my Favorites link and it would not work... URL timed out. I tried to PING it and got no response.
Checked my link and it shows the same URL address/subaddress as Norm's...
Just to prove it don't work, I clicked Norm's link.
It worked just fine.
So I tried my link again and it works just fine, too.
Remember, computers are neither smart nor dumb... They are just plain MEAN!
Thanks Norm! (I was going to put some sort of Smiley here, but can't figure out which one is appropriate.)
Norm48327 http://128.173.197.94:443/RRCmov
this link worked
The cam was down for me beginning around Monday, but was back up yesterday. Working fine since then.
Tom
Pittsburgh, PA
thanks for the link i never was able to see this befor.
please tell me what rrs im looking at and how many trains run a day. thanks
NS is the only railroad
The tracks run due East/West. East is to the left of the scene. The camera faces west-southwest.
If you go to Google Earth and enter these coordinates:
37°16'25.18"N, 79°56'22.24"W
that is the location (approximate) of the camera; it be the white rectangle on top of the overhead walkway from the Hotel Roanoke (on the north) to the Wachovia Building (on the south).
At present, the Google Earth image is old. The tracks were updated just last year and there are slight differences in the layout. Still 4 tracks, but the signal bridges and towers are gone, and the switching arrangement is different.
It seems to me that the traffic is down since the upgrade to the tracks, but maybe that is because the upgrade allows faster movement and they are not in the scene as long as before!
If you watch long enough you will see at least 3 different cabeese used as "Shoving Platforms" for a reverse move that goes to a couple of customers to the southeast. One is usually covered hoppers and oil tanks and the other will be mostly gondolas. I used to see a caboose outbound (east) between 11:00 AM and 1:00 PM and return (West) between noon and 3 PM almost daily (note the overlap, the job takes about an hour), but that seems to have changed recently and I don't know why the change or when they might be expected now. The caboose is almost always on the west end of the train (leading on the return trip).
In the past there have been some Autumn "Fall Colors" excursions that boarded passengers at the museum that is off screen to the left (east) behind the camera. These excursions have sometimes been powered by a steam locomotive.
Mostly you will see coal unit trains (loads east bound and empties west bound) some (nearly) unit automobile carrier trains, and other more general freight.
Since the shops are to the east (left, behind the camera) and there is a large yard to the west (Right) there are often movements of multiple engines going one way or the other. And many MOW work trains/equipment on their way out of the yard to a job somewhere else in the AM or coming home in the PM.
There is another camera at the Virginia Museum of Transportation that views the same tracks, but looking back at the Hotel camera from the west. The two cameras could see each other (they'd be tiny dots!) if it weren't for the pedestrian bridge that crosses the tracks halfway between them. The VMT cam is both worse and better than the Hotel cam... It is worse in that it only updates every 2 to 60 seconds and often seems to freeze on a scene and just keep updating that image. It is better in that it is much closer to the tracks, mounted lower, and there are security lights in the area that illluminate the scene at night.
See: http://www.nwhs.org/cam/vmt/
thanks for the update
BaltACD it was working fine until today now doedn't work Norm48327 http://128.173.197.94:443/RRCmov this link worked
Norm , your link works fine, also the (little red caboose) is still alive and rolling. Yesterday our web network was not working because suspected copper thieves cut the fiber cable Northern Az. was shut down. The financieal dealing took a bad hit because of this. This was cut north of New River wast of I-17. 6 hrs all was fixed. So far no Oil Trains were derailed today in Arizona , But the day isin't over yet.
Cannonball
Y6bs evergreen in my mind
looks like it rains alot in virginia. i see snow in the daylight and rain at night.
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