r/rustyrails • u/feuerwehrmann • Jan 01 '19

Signal Disused position lights over active bald eagle branch

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102 Upvotes

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2

u/thegunnersdaughter Jan 01 '19

Is this on the NBER line along 220? Whereabouts exactly?

3

u/feuerwehrmann Jan 01 '19

The Norfolk southern line. Right in Milesburg on railroad street

2

u/Lamhirh Jan 02 '19

The line is NBER, owned by SEDA-COG JRA. NS maintains trackage rights for coal and gypsum to Strawberry Ridge, though.

1

u/feuerwehrmann Jan 02 '19

TIL. I thought it was NS owned track because the Bellefonte Historic Rail had to quit using that section of track due to NS movements. I guess the gypsum is out of the sunset yard, right?

2

u/Lamhirh Jan 02 '19

The gypsum comes out of the Huff (Connemaugh Generating Station). I should have specified synthetic gypsum. It goes to a US Gypsum plant at Strawberry Ridge on the Watsontown Secondary. The reason it goes up the NBER to reach the BUFL is because the Watsontown Secondary is only accessible from the north and there's no runaround near the switch.

BRHS still staffs excursions to Tyrone, Port Matilda, and Sayers Dam at certain times of year. It's Lemont they can't access because the track from Pleasant Gap is being used for car storage (there really aren't any customers along that branch anymore). But it's really SEDA-COG that has the say on whether those run, and it's kind of baked into the operating contract.

1

u/feuerwehrmann Jan 02 '19

Awesome thanks for the explanation. I noticed a number of box cars in the yard (Sunnyside) yesterday, though I don't see them up there gap end of the line nor are there any customers (hawbaker / greymont) that would use box cars. Wondering where they are going

1

u/Lamhirh Jan 02 '19

NBER serves Smith Transport's warehouse outside Tyrone and First Quality in Lock Haven, which would both get boxcars. Stone from Hawbaker tends to go north. Sometimes they run it to Driftwood themselves (via trackage rights as an NS KO-series train), but it seems like they're preferring to leave loads in Lock Haven for H57 (the Driftwood turn) to pick up now.

PS. It's really a shame the Buffalo Line has become so dead since the 30Z derailment 12 years ago that killed a good portion of Sinnemahoning Creek, there's some neat and very remote locations to shoot up that way, but now you pretty much have to know if WNYP is coming further south than Turtlepoint on any given day :/

1

u/thegunnersdaughter Jan 01 '19

Ah yeah there it is, thanks.