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| (1557957) | |
PHOTOS: STATEN ISLAND RAILWAY |
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Posted by Jersey Mike on Thu Sep 17 21:53:16 2020 The Staten Island Railway is an odd duck to say the least. Ostensibly still an FRA railroad, it is run more like a transit system with no connection to the national network and a variety of FRA waivers. While the equipment consists of NYCTA St. Louis Car R44's, the line is equipped with Baltimore and Ohio Color Position Lights and cab signals? This strange situation has its roots stretching back to the 19th century, but today most of my interest is centered on the B&O CPL based signaling system and to a lesser degree, the R44s. I have ridden the SIR on two other occasions, the first in 2000 when I only had a film camera, the second in 2004 when I went over to see what was up with the re-signaling project. A required secondary trip for the SIR is the related Staten Island Ferry to be prepared for the requisite photos of the Statue of Liberty and downtown when you check out the full set of photos here (mirror). In addition I went out to get pictures of remaining classic interlocking towers on the IND Fulton St line.Kicking things off south of Baltimore early in the AM, the brutalist BWI Airport Rail Station has been rebuilt as a coffee shoppe.  Proceeding to downtown Manhattan via the PATH, I emerged from the underground at the new Fulton Transportation center and its billion dollar view of the sky.   Taking photos of the defunct Central Railroad of New Jersey Communipaw terminal is perhaps the one rail related thing one can do on the Staten Island Ferry.  The free Staten Island Ferry is the most affordable way to get photos of the Statue of Liberty and Lower Manhattan.   Most of the 10 tracks at the St George ferry terminal are used for mid-day car storage. The 61 R44 cars, built by St. Louis Car in 1973, make up the entirety of the fleet. #400 shown here, is not the class leader as their numbering starts with #388.  The 290 NYCTA cars were retired in 2010 due to a surprise discovery of frame cracks and corrosion. With a lighter duty schedule and different maintenance regime the SIR cars were not affected and are now approaching their 50th year in service. Here numbers 392, 450 and 446 can be seen at the railroad east end of the station platform waiting their next call to service.  TOWER B was constructed by the B&O around 1952 and housed a GRS N-X type interlocking panel to control the St. George terminal and eventually the other end of the line in Tottenville. Although the 2004 CTC project consolidated dispatching functions in a new TOWER A built on the other side of the terminal, the terminal interlocking logic inside the original tower was not replaced and TOWER B still serves as a alternate control center with a replacement panel interface.  Since forward views from the SIR cars are limited to a peephole, frequently blocked by the crews, I didn't have much to do until I arrived at my destination of Huguenot. Here we can see #400 passing by the eastbound signal at WOLF interlocking, approaching the signal at POND interlocking displaying a Clear signal indication.  Wayside CPL signals on the SIR are located only at interlockings with intermediate signaling being handled by a new pulse code based cab signal system similar to the type used on main line railroads. The cab signals and intermediate interlockings were installed as part of the 2004 CTC project. Prior to that the line has used hand throw switches and temporary block-stations to conduct single track operations.  The stations were never set up for fare control with conductors collecting tickets until turnstyles were installed at St George and, later, Thompkisville. As the vast majority of passenger traffic connects to the SIF there was little revenue loss making the rest of the line a fare free zone. Therefore there is no need for the slate roofed ticket office to be open to the public.   The SIR MoW fleet consists of 4 BL20G road switches purchased in conjunction with Metro North's order of 12 passenger capable BL20GHs. This replaced a pair of elderly Alco switchers that was subsequently donated to museums. I caught #779 attached to some ballast hoppers on the MoW siding at Huguenot.  The mid-day headways were terrible, which prevented me from visiting other stations as each stop would have resulted in a minimum 30 minute time penalty. Also, MoW work was causing some service disruptions and mu westbound trainset arrived before the following eastbound, depriving me of a photo op. With 30 minute headways I suspect the SIR was only running two trainsets and #400 showed up adjacent to a Clear signal at WOLD interlocking for the tardy eastbound.  The source of the delays was some MoW work at Thompkinsville, where some strange single tracking was going on. Despite the 30 minute headways, the schedule was not adjusted to prevent inbound and outbound trains meeting within the single track area. Here my train departs Thompkinsville under an Approach Proceed Cab signal indication on the VICTORY interlocking 10W signal just before SIR BL20G #776 runs through the station in preparation to enter the Thompkinsville siding from the east end. An eastbound train then advanced forward on the westbound track led by SIR #444.  As BL20G #776 was moving westward through HANNAH interlocking, the eastbound SIR local received a Clear signal on the HANNAH 2W signal and continued to wrong rail to the next crossover.  #776 then advanced into the Thompkinsville siding to couple up to some flatcars.  The MoW train when shoved ahead past a slow approach signal and onto the main.  My SIR tour complete, I got lunch in St. George and proceeded back to the SIF. The SIF has an interesting railroad connection in that all the boats are powered by diesel engines built by EMD. For example the Andrew J. Barberi, shown below, has 3 16 cylinder 645E's.  The new SIF Whitehall terminal provides direct connections to the 1/9 and N/R subway stations.  R train with NYCTA R46 #5834 at Jay St.  A train with NYCTA R46 #6054 at Hoyt.  Active interlocking tower at Hoyt St with its original GRS Model 5 pistol grip interlocking machine.   Although the tower at Utica Ave is still active, it is not normally staffed unless there is a need to cross over trains due to track work or other disruption. The Model 5 pistol grip interlocking machine can be seen in the center of the room. Green lights on the model board indicate track occupancy. Blue lights indicate track occupancy within the length of a station platform.  R46 A train at Utica Ave.  The tower at Broadway Jct is set back from the end of the platform and lacks direct view windows so here is a photo of an A train with R46 #6234 at Dr. Van Nostrand Ave.  My goal was to visit the tower at Lafayette, which necessitated changing to a C train local at Nostrand. I lucked out and was presented with a set of R32's including #3411 shown here.  A Train of R46's passing through Lafayette on the central express tracks. My luck would end there as I had forgotten that, for some inexplicable reason, Lafayette did not have a Mezzanine and since I was both up against the clock and already had pictures of Lafayette, I decided just to abort instead of riding to Hoyt (1 headway), riding back to Lafayette (1 headway), continuing to Utita (1 headway) and then finally resuming my trip downtown (1 headway). Time constraints was also why I just caught an R160 C trainset instead of waiting for the next train of R32s.  The ticking clock was due to my need to catch a certain outbound express train at Grand Central, which I arrived to find waiting on one of the upper lever 30 series tracks adjacent to P32AC-DM #209. End cars on my train of M7's were #4164, #4159.    From there I would travel to my overnight destination from where I would embark upon a driving/walking tour of Metro North Drawbridges (sounds exciting, right?). |
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Re: PHOTOS: STATEN ISLAND RAILWAY |
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Posted by r33/r36 mainline on Thu Sep 17 22:24:11 2020, in response to PHOTOS: STATEN ISLAND RAILWAY, posted by Jersey Mike on Thu Sep 17 21:53:16 2020. Nice photos and write up!That NTT C train is an R179, not an R160. One thing I love about SIR is it uses subway cars but has railroad style signaling and uses a real locomotive for MOW operations. I do wonder why they didn't just use the same work locomotives NYCT uses for fleet uniformity, oh well. |
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Re: PHOTOS: STATEN ISLAND RAILWAY |
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Posted by gbs on Thu Sep 17 23:51:35 2020, in response to PHOTOS: STATEN ISLAND RAILWAY, posted by Jersey Mike on Thu Sep 17 21:53:16 2020. The new SIF Whitehall terminal provides direct connections to the 1/9 and N/R subway stations. It doesn't. You have to go outside a walk a bit to the subway entrance. Only in New York do they miss an opportunity to connect a terminal directly to the subway nearby. (And "1/9"? When was this written?) I had forgotten that, for some inexplicable reason, Lafayette did not have a Mezzanine It does. Lafayette Av (C) has a huge mezzanine (but no exit to Lafayette Av). |
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| (1557975) | |
Re: PHOTOS: STATEN ISLAND RAILWAY |
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Posted by Jersey Mike on Fri Sep 18 01:08:58 2020, in response to Re: PHOTOS: STATEN ISLAND RAILWAY, posted by gbs on Thu Sep 17 23:51:35 2020. It didn't have a mezzanine that let me cross to the far platform inside fare control, or at least I couldn't locate it and this wasn't the first time I had been tripped up by the layout. |
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| (1557983) | |
Re: PHOTOS: STATEN ISLAND RAILWAY |
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Posted by randyo on Fri Sep 18 02:27:36 2020, in response to PHOTOS: STATEN ISLAND RAILWAY, posted by Jersey Mike on Thu Sep 17 21:53:16 2020. If you have the opportunity to actually get inside the Utica tower, and look at the model board in a certain light, you can actually see the raised areas N/O Rockaway Av where the diamond Xovers between the exp tks were and are now painted over. The switch and signal levers are still on the machine although since they are spar levers, they are painted yellow instead of the standard red and black. |
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Re: PHOTOS: STATEN ISLAND RAILWAY |
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Posted by ChicagoMotorman on Fri Sep 18 14:43:13 2020, in response to PHOTOS: STATEN ISLAND RAILWAY, posted by Jersey Mike on Thu Sep 17 21:53:16 2020. AWESOME11111111111111111111 |
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Re: PHOTOS: STATEN ISLAND RAILWAY |
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Posted by https://salaamallah.com/ on Fri Sep 18 16:23:24 2020, in response to PHOTOS: STATEN ISLAND RAILWAY, posted by Jersey Mike on Thu Sep 17 21:53:16 2020. NICE PHOTOS |
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Re: PHOTOS: STATEN ISLAND RAILWAY |
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Posted by Express Rider on Fri Sep 18 23:05:24 2020, in response to PHOTOS: STATEN ISLAND RAILWAY, posted by Jersey Mike on Thu Sep 17 21:53:16 2020. Excellent photos!! Thank you very much for posting! |
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Re: PHOTOS: STATEN ISLAND RAILWAY |
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Posted by Fisk Ave Jim on Sat Sep 19 10:54:38 2020, in response to PHOTOS: STATEN ISLAND RAILWAY, posted by Jersey Mike on Thu Sep 17 21:53:16 2020. Great stuff, Mike. Can always look forward to quality with your photos! |
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Re: PHOTOS: STATEN ISLAND RAILWAY |
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Posted by gbs on Sat Sep 19 22:13:51 2020, in response to Re: PHOTOS: STATEN ISLAND RAILWAY, posted by Jersey Mike on Fri Sep 18 01:08:58 2020. Correct. Many huge IND mezzanines were later reconfigured (often with chain-link fencing), allowing anyone entering from the street at any staircase to proceed to the only token booth, centrally located. This eliminated the cross-over capability, which had been originally built in to the design. |
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Re: PHOTOS: STATEN ISLAND RAILWAY |
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Posted by randyo on Sun Sep 20 01:29:09 2020, in response to Re: PHOTOS: STATEN ISLAND RAILWAY, posted by gbs on Sat Sep 19 22:13:51 2020. The only IND stations I noticed that had a potential crossover capability removed were the ones in Queens. |
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Re: PHOTOS: STATEN ISLAND RAILWAY |
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Posted by Jersey Mike on Mon Sep 21 08:13:03 2020, in response to Re: PHOTOS: STATEN ISLAND RAILWAY, posted by Fisk Ave Jim on Sat Sep 19 10:54:38 2020. Glad you enjoy them! |
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Re: PHOTOS: STATEN ISLAND RAILWAY |
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Posted by TransitChuckG on Mon Sep 21 10:31:33 2020, in response to Re: PHOTOS: STATEN ISLAND RAILWAY, posted by r33/r36 mainline on Thu Sep 17 22:24:11 2020. Great photos and narrative! Thanks, JerseyMike |
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Re: PHOTOS: STATEN ISLAND RAILWAY |
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Posted by Express Rider on Tue Sep 22 22:00:33 2020, in response to Re: PHOTOS: STATEN ISLAND RAILWAY, posted by Express Rider on Fri Sep 18 23:05:24 2020. I rode the line during the summer of 1967. I took several photos along the line, and one or two 3/4 views of cars layed up at Tottenville. |
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