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Discussion Boards => General Discussion => Topic started by: jettrainfan on March 28, 2010, 03:55:33 PM

Title: question about what i saw Sat.
Post by: jettrainfan on March 28, 2010, 03:55:33 PM
I was railfanning at berea as usual and saw some pretty unusual things. The most surprising was a N.S. intermodel on the CSX line! my dad & i started to make plans to match speeds with it because it was stopped at the signal. Then over the scanner they said they were going to the N.S. line. That, right their was a surprise! (more surprising than the 2 Canadian nationals that came by earlier.) Can anyone explain what they were doing on the CSX line and why they went back to the N.S. line? I've only seen that switch been used for W&LE so its quite confusing.

Thanks!
Title: Re: question about what i saw Sat.
Post by: pdlethbridge on March 28, 2010, 04:12:10 PM
It could have been a problem on their line that required them to use CSX. It's common that some railroads have trackage rights over other railroads.
and from wikipedia we have this

Trackage rights

Trackage rights (or running rights, or running powers (UK)) is an arrangement where the company that owns the line retains all rights, but allows another company to operate over certain sections of its track. The agreement may specify whether the latter company can serve customers on the line. In some cases, the former company may opt to not run any trains over the line but still own it; this can also be done via a partial lease. Overhead trackage rights or incidental trackage rights refers to the case of the latter company not being allowed to serve customers along the line. It is only granted the right to "overfly" the right-of-way of the lessor, using the tracks of the lessor's railroad.

Trackage rights can be temporary or long-term as needed. Temporary rights agreements are typically made when some kind of disaster affects one railroad while a parallel railroad line is fully operational. The parallel railroad will often grant temporary rights to the affected railroad until the problem is resolved.
Long-term agreements can be made to allow competing railroads access to potentially profitable shippers or to act as a bridge route between otherwise disconnected sections of another railroad. A union station typically involves trackage rights; the company that owns the station and associated trackage is typically owned in part by the railroads that use it, which operate over it by trackage rights. In the United States, all such agreements are filed with the Surface Transportation Board and are available as a matter of public record.
Title: Re: question about what i saw Sat.
Post by: jettrainfan on March 28, 2010, 04:17:29 PM
that could be it, N.S. was slow that day.
Title: Re: question about what i saw Sat.
Post by: RAM on March 28, 2010, 04:29:37 PM
some one had a bog derailment of a coal train yesterday.
Title: Re: question about what i saw Sat.
Post by: jward on March 29, 2010, 10:06:54 AM
it would help if you told us exactly where this occurred. ns and csx cross in literally hundreds of places.
Title: Re: question about what i saw Sat.
Post by: jettrainfan on March 29, 2010, 03:39:24 PM
Berea Ohio. The first interchange coming east bound on the CSX line.
Title: Re: question about what i saw Sat.
Post by: jward on March 29, 2010, 05:05:16 PM
this train was eastbound off the "big 4" line to columbus and indianapolis? if so that is highly unusual. there must have been a wreck somewhere and it was a detour train. it would also explain why the ns line here in pittsburgh was dead yesterday, with only about 1/3 the normal amount of trains.

my guess is that there was a derailment somewhere east of ft wayne on the single track wabash line. if so, the train you saw would have been coming from west of ft wayne, and heading somewhere east of cleveland, and detoured over the former b&o line through williard, to the big 4 at greenwich, oh. i have checqued the web for news of a derailment but as yet have been unable to find any.
Title: Re: question about what i saw Sat.
Post by: pdlethbridge on March 29, 2010, 06:13:56 PM
Could also have been track repair
Title: Re: question about what i saw Sat.
Post by: jward on March 29, 2010, 06:33:08 PM
doubtful it was track repair. ns has 2 lines west from cleveland, the former nickle plate via bellevue, and the former nyc via toledo. they would have detoured any trains due to track work via the nickle plate, or held them until the work crews cleared.
Title: Re: question about what i saw Sat.
Post by: jettrainfan on March 29, 2010, 09:14:49 PM
Quote from: jward on March 29, 2010, 05:05:16 PM
this train was eastbound off the "big 4" line to columbus and indianapolis?

That's the one.
Title: Re: question about what i saw Sat.
Post by: jbsmith on March 29, 2010, 11:00:51 PM
Every now and then where i live,,SW MI and NW IN,,i sometimes  UP and BNSF locos.
I have seen BNSF on tracks were i normaly see NS and CSX.
This weekend while out and about near Napanee IN i saw UP locos.
I have seen UP on CN tracks [Formerly GTW] in South Bend.
Seems unusal to see them EAST of Chicago but they do show up here every now and again.
Title: Re: question about what i saw Sat.
Post by: ebtnut on March 30, 2010, 05:07:42 PM
Foreign power is a pretty common sight these days.  We see UP and BNSF power fairly regularly here in the mid-Atlantic area.  In many cases, the roads have some sort of pooling arrangement wereby through trains keep their motive power from end to end to save time.  Ultimately, the number crunchers keep track of how many miles/hours the foreign power runs over the their road and the costs are balanced against their power running on the other lines.  Kind of similar to per diem for freight cars. 
Title: Re: question about what i saw Sat.
Post by: RAM on March 30, 2010, 06:18:46 PM
Year ago if you saw a train you knew what railroad it was. 
Title: Re: question about what i saw Sat.
Post by: jward on March 31, 2010, 05:26:13 AM
as an update:
there was a derailment on the former nyc near toledo last weekend. the train you saw was a detour. that also explains why sunday was so dead around here. we only saw about 10 trains all day.
Title: Re: question about what i saw Sat.
Post by: jsmvmd on March 31, 2010, 12:54:17 PM
Thanks, Jeff.

Good work, as usual.

Jack
Altoona, PA
Title: Re: question about what i saw Sat.
Post by: pcctrolleyII on March 31, 2010, 06:17:41 PM
Well I saw and BNSF this past weekend around Philadelphia Pa in the richmond area witch for me was not a every day sight. Though i well say there was NS engines hooked up to itfront and back.
Title: Re: question about what i saw Sat.
Post by: jettrainfan on March 31, 2010, 07:20:28 PM
Quote from: pcctrolleyII on March 31, 2010, 06:17:41 PM
Well I saw and BNSF this past weekend around Philadelphia Pa in the richmond area witch for me was not a every day sight. Though i well say there was NS engines hooked up to itfront and back.

Probably making sure it doesn't do anything funny!  ;D
Title: Re: question about what i saw Sat.
Post by: jward on March 31, 2010, 10:45:20 PM
on many of the former prr lines ns inherited from conrail, locomotives are required to have cab signals to lead. what this means to the casual observer is that mostly former conrail units, and oes ns bought since the merger, are used as leaders. any "foreign" units would be buied n the middle of the consist. the only exceptions i know of are certain csx units (mostly ex conrail or bought since the merger) which have comptable cab signals and are allowed to lead ns trains.

in some cases, notably the conrail cleveland line and fort wayne lines west of coway, pa, and the conemaugh line east of freeport, pa, there re no lineside signals except at control points. all sgnal indications at oter points are transmitted through th rails and picked up by the cab signal equipment.....

Title: Re: question about what i saw Sat.
Post by: jettrainfan on April 02, 2010, 12:54:30 AM
Dont know if this would help anymore but i think it wont now. I had a problem with the memory so that's why i haven't uploaded this.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LLgGLu5_oZo

Hope this clears things up...
Title: Re: question about what i saw Sat.
Post by: jward on April 02, 2010, 09:11:21 PM
that routing was very common during the conrail days. almost everything to and from the big 4 used the former new york central mainline out of downtown cleveland. the current csx line east of berea was a branchline used mostly for overflow traffic to avoid congestion on the other line.
Title: Re: question about what i saw Sat.
Post by: RAM on April 02, 2010, 11:46:05 PM
If you are going to take telephotos, than you need to use a tripod.
Title: Re: question about what i saw Sat.
Post by: jettrainfan on April 03, 2010, 12:33:37 AM
Quote from: RAM on April 02, 2010, 11:46:05 PM
If you are going to take telephotos, than you need to use a tripod.

I know, im working on getting one  :-\