| Volume 39 Issue 11 | July 2000 |
| Volume 39 Issue 11 | July 2000 |
On memorial Day weekend this year I went to visit my favorite sister (she lives about 100 feet from the Pittsburgh to Cleveland Norfolk Southern main) in Alliance, Ohio. Even though it was a holiday weekend, there did not seem to be much let up in the traffic. There were a lot of intermodal and several general freights. Also saw the AMTRAK daylight trains. They had four passenger cars and up to a dozen roadrailers. There were several DEEX unit coal trains with helpers headed west. THe traffic moves quickly on the double track with only a short drop in speed for the junction. There did not seem to be much traffic on the Fort Wayne line or to the C&P. I believe the C&P is used for coal trains.
On Sunday I got a chance to check out the C&P line down to Yellow Creek. The junction at Bayard does not have much track left. The line to Canton is gone nd the line to Minerva is used as an interchange for the line that goes from Minerva to Carrolton. There are several locations between Alliance and Bayard that would make great photos if you could find out when something was moving that way. There was one train that had to have a new crew north of Alliance that the dispatcher was going to send to Bayard, but the time and weather did not allow for chasing it. The dispatcher was going to have the crew van follow it down to Bayard because it did not look like the train was going to make it to Conway before they ran out of time.
On the way back to Alliance I stopped at the Sebring Model Railroad Club. THey are located in a former PRR freight house right next to the NS. They have a fairly large layout. They are in the process of conversion to DCC and are updating several areas of the layout. The are having their annual open houses on the 2 weekends before Thanksgiving. If anyone is interested in more information or a possible trip up that way, let me know
It rained a lot on Sunday afternoon which led to several interesting radio conversations between the Cleveland Line Dispatcher and the trains. A train reported water running over the westbound rails. The dispatcher read the rule book to the trains. It said that is the water was less than 2" over the rails, trains could proceed at 10mph. If the water was over 2" then the trains could not cross. This information led to one crew asking is anyone had a ruler. The next train eastbound through the area reported that it looked like the water was below the rail tops and if the trains went through at speed they would keep it blown away. There were no more conversations about water.
© 1999, 2000 Division 3, MCR, NMRA