Congratulations to Brian Hanel on winning the Photography Contest this time, with his shot from Hill 582 at Cajon Pass! (He got my vote!)
Carl
Railroader Emeritus (practiced railroading for 46 years--and in 2010 I finally got it right!)
CAACSCOCOM--I don't want to behave improperly, so I just won't behave at all. (SM)
The ButlerCarl, which set of retarders is Tower A responsible for, the pair to the west or the pair to the east of the diamond?
Both! You didn't think I had it easy up there or anything, did you?
(I also had to handle the crossover switches, and the three switches immediately below (to the right of) the lower retarders--one on the north and two on the south. About five people who have been on the Forum have been lucky enough to see me work...it won't happen again!)
Getting over my cold, but not before having to delay our Michigan trip (would have hated to infect the new baby or her mother!). Instead, we saw a few trains at LaGrange, and one on the CN at Addison. I like the looks of the IC spartan-cab SD70s, but they look downright ominous when there are a pair of them mid-train serving as DPUs.
CShaveRR tree68: Try this. Larry had better luck than I did. Take his result, enlarge it one enlargement, move it two steps west and one step north, and you'll have pretty much what I was describing.
tree68: Try this.
Try this.
Larry had better luck than I did. Take his result, enlarge it one enlargement, move it two steps west and one step north, and you'll have pretty much what I was describing.
James
CShaveRR Ah, Jim, you know it well, then! If the guy we'd been pushing had lost his air, we would have had to lose ours in a hurry!
Ah, Jim, you know it well, then! If the guy we'd been pushing had lost his air, we would have had to lose ours in a hurry!
Ah, Jim, you know it well, then! If the guy we'd been pushing had lost his air, we would have had to lose ours in a hurry! We cut off him a short distance east of Belton Junction, and as we were going through there the engineer looked at me (still the rookie) and asked, "Ever run an absolute before?"
CShaveRR One time when I was working between Proviso and Butler (Milwaukee), we had a train ahead of us that was having a rough time. We were told by the dispatcher to cut off from our own train and give him a push, which we did, then went back to our train. The train ahead stalled again, and the second time we pushed him, we took our train with us. Humorous tale there about how we went through an absolute signal without stopping, with the train ahead just a few carlengths away from us, but that's another story.
One time when I was working between Proviso and Butler (Milwaukee), we had a train ahead of us that was having a rough time. We were told by the dispatcher to cut off from our own train and give him a push, which we did, then went back to our train. The train ahead stalled again, and the second time we pushed him, we took our train with us. Humorous tale there about how we went through an absolute signal without stopping, with the train ahead just a few carlengths away from us, but that's another story.
I shoved somebody like that once up West Allis hill; my only thought as we cut off on the fly was, "I sure hope he doesn't lose his air"!!!!
Nance - the "type" is a truck design consideration. "A1A", "B-B", etc are wheel arrangements.
Other truck designations you may see are Blomberg (EMD), Flexicoil, HTC, and plenty of others.
Found this, which you may find informative.
Larry Resident Microferroequinologist (at least at my house) Everyone goes home; Safety begins with you My Opinion. Standard Disclaimers Apply. No Expiration Date Come ride the rails with me! There's one thing about humility - the moment you think you've got it, you've lost it...
Yes! So a type B truck has nothing to do with a B-B configuration, etc? It's weird bc they talk about an A1A truck, which confuses me even more.
Oh, I think I'm hopeless!! I did well in school but must be old age robbed me of my gray matter!
Nance-CCABW/LEI
“Even if you are on the right track, you’ll get run over if you just sit there.” --Will Rogers
Whether you think you can, or you think you can't, you're right! --unknown
Let me guess...it was an S3, S4, or S6, and not an S1 or S2, and it had AAR Type A trucks.
That would be a standard two-axle truck as applied under switchers (many Alco switchers and a lot of EMDs as well). That has no connection with the wheel arrangement.
An AAR Type B truck, by the way, is found under most four-axle Alco road locomotives, as well as early GE locomotives (and a few AA, SOO, and GM&O GP30s and GP35s that had Alco units traded in on them).
I just don't understand what they are talking about. Is it all one in the same; no wait, it can't be. So yes, I guess so. Thanks.
An example in context?
Hello, I've got a question. I know I asked about this before, sort of, but now I understand a bit more, sort of.
I (think) I've got the B-B and C-C stuff down. but as I was studying, I came across that , for example, an Alco switcher is a type A. WHAT??!! (Just for the record, I'm a bit type-A myself, but I KNOW that's not what they're talking about!! )
This has something to do with the trucks but...
A blah day today in Chicagoland--it got up into the mid-fifties earlier this afternoon, and I was out on my bike (only two scoots went through in the 15 minutes or so I was trackside), but now it's raining and the temperature has fallen by ten degrees. The good news is that the last old ice in our yard finally disappeared...just in time for the rain to change to snow by tomorrow morning.
Lots of bodies out on the east end of CP Y019. Can't quite figure out what was going on, but it's somewhat beyond the new crossovers. Could they be putting in the footings for a new signal bridge?
Mookie's cold has traveled almost as fast as the weather currents, and I'm trying desperately to recover from it. I hope to have gotten rid of it by Sunday, when we want to head north to visit our new grand-niece.
Welcome to Rogredcap!
Nance, in response to your question, the first thing that should happen when a train stalls is that the dispatcher be notified. He'll probably be the one to make a decision as to what is done, and he may even provide protection for the backup move (though there would have to be a person back there to protect grade crossings, if any--something else that they would know).
First, rogredcap:. Glad to have you aboard!
Second, if it's found that a train can't/won't make a grade, do they back it up to retry or call for a helper? Would they try it more than once? Is this comp. policy or crew (who on the crew??) discretion? When a train is in shove (a.k.a. push-back?) mode, are they required to have a person on the leading end? How far can/would they back up, bc I'm thinking it would need to go back quite far to get a good run at the hill. Thanks, as always.
rogredcap Hello everyone I'm new here.....
What are you interested in ? Got any questions ? This is a great place to ask - no question is viewed as being too basic or "newbie", 'cause we've all been there - and answering is usually an opportunity to take a fresh look at the subject for the person answering. And there's lots of resources here as well.
- Paul North.
To add just a little bit: The "bowl" of the classification yard is called such because in an ideal situation, it has that shape if you viewed the tracks' profile from the side - down from the hump, flat for most of the way down the "body" tracks, and then a slight rise in grade at the far end to keep the rolling cars from going out of the yard - which also assists any switching operations at that end, too.
Actually "bowl" doesn't seem to be quite the right term to me, because the grades aren't that steep and the bottom isn't that short - I'd compare it to a dinner plate in cross-section instead (although maybe when those grades are compressed and fore-shortened with a telephoto lens or similar, it does look like a bowl anyway). So now you know why I'm not often asked to name anything . . .
P.S. - See also this photo by our fellow Forum member and frequent photo-poster here Charles Freericks - the hump is out of the photo to the right, but the bowl is straight ahead: http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=311117 - PDN.
P.P.S. - Better yet, see this one - the "bowl" is all the tracks in the foreground, the hump is in the far left background: http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=341275 - PDN.
Hello everyone I'm new here.....
Great; thanks, guys. Nice teamwork!
tree68 Try this.
Nance, I'm going to try this, in hopes that it gives you the same picture I saw:
(My URL didn't work--Larry was more successful in the following post! Thanks, Larry!)
This is the hump where I used to work. The hump leads (two tracks; there are cars on the top track) come in just to the right of the upper left corner, curving down and toward the right. You will see a road going under the lead; semi-trailers have ample clearance on that passageway, though it is below ground level directly under the tracks. Keep going to the right and you see a fairly large black square; this is the Top of the Hump yard office. The leads at this point are probably 30 feet or so above the surrounding area. Follow the leads further to the right, and there's a double-crossover, complete with diamond, in the leads, directly above another black rectangle. This rectangle is Tower A, which was my home away from home for many, many years. Keep going to the right, and you can see how the leads diverge and spread out into a number of classification tracks (66, in this case). Just to the right of where the road crosses from one side to the other, you can see the two lower towers, B and C, on the edges of the trackage. By this time, the tracks are fairly close to the surrounding ground level. This (from here on to the right) is the bowl, and these tracks each carry a classification. Freight cars are pulled out the other end and formed into departing trains (this description is a little idealistic--sometimes tracks have more than one classification; sometimes cars are pulled back up on the hump leads or out the main, etc.).
I hope this makes things a little clearer; because of the size of such an operation, this is about the only way you'd get both a hump and a bowl in the same photograph.
Hi, can anyone link me to a picture showing a hump and bowl of a yard? Thanks in advance.
That isn't too hard, Paul. The classification bowl (Yard 5) should be fairly obvious. East of there are Yard 4 (north) and Yard 2 (south). Those are basically departure yards. South of the classification bowl, surrounded by intermodal apparatus, is Global 2 (on the site of old Yard 1). Between Global 2 and the suburban mains are the departure mains, some of which can serve as running tracks when necessary.
No receiving yard here--that's Yard 9, around the corner to the north.
OK, so my batting average is only "1 for 3" there - but that's OK, since that "1" was a home run "outta da park" . . . I too was surprised at the extent of the changes at the east end.
And summertime seems like a good time for train rides and ice cream to me . . .
Next time I'll try to figure out how to coherently describe and ask which 'yard' performs which functions there . . .
Paul, my retirement privileges do include free rides in off-peak hours, so yes, I'll be taking a little more advantage of that (unfortunately, Pat still has to pay).
All of those photographs are fascinating, because I honestly didn't know how they were going to shoehorn the third track into some of those places (I still don't, but the pictures at least show where they'll be attempting to put them!). The complete shift of the main lines at the east end is something I hadn't counted on, and now I can see how things will be speeded up and connected up. The pilings I saw were for the bridge over the creek.
Prying the grandchildren free for a train trip would be nice, but those kids are so busily scheduled that that won't be possible at least until summer. Today we had a good lunch session with them, but the girls' hair was still wet from their swimming lessons, and kindergarten was right after lunch for the oldest one.
Carl - and anyone else who's interested -
Go to this webpage - http://www.createprogram.org/b2geometrics.html - and see "Geometric Images 3 - 5" inclusive of the 14 that are there, and all will become clear regarding the flyover !
After only a brief review of those, since I doubt your UP retiree privileges include a pass for free rides on METRA, I anticipate you better figure on a monthly pass for off-peak hours - and consider scheduling weekly round-trip train rides for the grandkids !
I got lucky since this B-2 project was part of the TIGER I grant application that was approved for $133 Million - see:
http://www.createprogram.org/PDF/NEW%20PAGE%20PDFS/FR1%20CREATE%20TIGER%20Application1%20_FINAL_electronic.pdf (28 pages, 2.2 MB in size), which has lots of 'hot links' to other documents, plans, reports, and details, etc.
http://www.createprogram.org/PDF/NEW%20PAGE%20PDFS/Stimulus%20Project%20Descriptions%20FINAL.pdf
http://www.createprogram.org/newpageLINKED.html
The information on the CREATE website otherwise is mostly text and tables, with very few plans or drawings that are even conceptual in nature. Why that is, I don't know or understand - the folks who put all that together must have had a least a sketch plan to perform the screening and preliminary cost estimates, etc. a couple years ago, so why not post them too ? I sent them an e-mail about that early last summer, but I never received a response, and can't see that anything along those lines has been implemented . . .
For the "Way Too Much Information" level on this, see the "B2 Project Report" in the TIGER application at this link:
WARNING: It's 1,013 pages+of various sizes - including 24" x 36" plan-size sheets, approx. 69 MB in size !
http://www.createprogram.org/PDF/NEW%20PAGE%20PDFS/CREATE%20Program%20Project%20B2%20Phase%20I%20Project%20Report%20&%20Design%20Approval%20June%202008%20final.pdf
The "B3 Melrose Connection" at - http://www.createprogram.org/PDF/B3%20benefits%20Melrose%20Connection.pdf - has a 3rd photo of the new bridge, from its other/ southern end, but otherwise is similar to the link that Carl posted above. One very interesting detail is that the "inner"/ eastern girders of both the long and short spans - it's a 2-span Through Plate Girder ("TPG") bridge - is somewhat taller than the "outer"/ western girders ! (even though it does not appear to be connected to the existing parallel adjacent bridge to the east). I've not seen that before - and so can only speculate that someone anticipates and made provisions for replacement of that adjoining bridge sometime in the future, by allowing for connecting the replacement bridge's floor system to those taller girders as well. We'll just have to see what happens . . .
My "curiosity itch" has been satisfied for now - maybe more sometime later.
Forgot to mention yesterday's action. Besides shaking my head and muttering "Tennis elbow?" all morning, we went to Elmhurst, where we were able to catch the "Another Train Warning System" in action. The voice of the system (sounds a lot like the voice that announces the arrival of Metra trains in the station--that could get confusing!) can be heard for about half a block away. Pat got a kick out of the signal maintainers that were nearby, and their fist-pumping and "Glory Be!" gestures when the devices actually worked.
We had five freights go through in the hour or so that we were near the tracks (Fontano's was closed for vacation, so we ate where I couldn't see the trains), and they were almost all manifests, so I have enough sightings to keep me occupied for a few hours. We have a patronage (and grandpatronage) visit to make today; perhaps I can parlay that into some BNSF action.
Paul, this is part of two interconnected CREATE projects:
http://www.createprogram.org/PDF/B2%20Fact%20Sheet.pdf
http://www.createprogram.org/PDF/PDF%2012-16-10/B3%20CREATE%20Project%20Fact%20Sheet_12_14_10.pdf
A line from this portion of the yard would permit trains leaving east out of the departure mains (or out of Global 2) to have direct access to the IHB. The trains from the mains can get to Provo Junction, but currently block both of the main tracks while doing it. The pilings are a short distance north of the suburban tracks, and on both sides of the creek. They are not driven vertically into the ground, but rather at angles and meeting at the tops of the pilings. A flyover is mentioned in B2--it sounds like it will both connect to our main line (?) and go to the IHB. This sounds like a new bridge over the tracks, evidence of which I haven't seen. This will bear watching. C.S. Harrier may yet ride again (that's because taking Metra is the best way I can think of to see this!)!
In the bottom right of the picture on the B3 sheet, the bridge has two spans. You're looking through the bridge along the tracks connecting the east end of the yard to the main line. The main line itself (two tracks, soon to be three) goes under the span to the right.
Mud Creek is how it's shown on all of the Proviso maps, but I've seen it as Addison Creek everywhere else. I like Mud Creek myself--it's appropriate, and this stream doesn't go anywhere near the village of Addison (further west) or Addison Township, and Addison Street in Chicago doesn't intersect it, either.
There's a bigger Drury Lane theater considerably west of the one you saw, in Oak Brook (or Oakbrook Terrace). In fact, I hadn't heard of one in Westchester before. The "major rail line" you mentioned isn't so major any more--it's CN's former Illinois Central line into Iowa, and probably sees little more than local traffic and a daily manifest.
Paul_D_North_Jr And completely unrelated: In a nod to a former Trains staffer and author - librarian George H. Drury - I stumbled across a "Drury Lane" about 2 miles south of here in the Westchester area, abutting the south side of another major rail line, just south of W. Roosevelt Rd., about a block east of Westchester Blvd., and on the west side of Gardner Rd. Wonder if he's got 'dibs' on any of the good trainwatching sites there ? - Paul North.
And completely unrelated: In a nod to a former Trains staffer and author - librarian George H. Drury - I stumbled across a "Drury Lane" about 2 miles south of here in the Westchester area, abutting the south side of another major rail line, just south of W. Roosevelt Rd., about a block east of Westchester Blvd., and on the west side of Gardner Rd. Wonder if he's got 'dibs' on any of the good trainwatching sites there ?
Johnny
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