13-04-20 PHOTOS and VIDEOS: (1) South Ferry (1)

Due to my whiplash trip to Boston during the lockdown weekend I am really having to break my photoset up simply because I took such a wide variety of pictures as my plans careened back and forth from cancelling my trip and pressing on to Boston. If you remember the last set of Photos I was left on the Sandy Ferry with no hope of completing my trip and my sights set on an Amtrak train from Philly to Baltimore departing at 9:30pm. Well I got as far as Robeling, NJ when I got word and Train 66 was un-cancelled and after booking a ticket I headed back to NYC and found myself in Penn Station with about 4 hours to burn before the 2AM scheduled arrival.

Luckily there was one major sight I had wanted to see that would not be affected by the darkness and that was the brand new old loop at the South Ferry terminal on the (1). I had previously gotten photos and video of the loop operations with my old camera, but the video was low def and I had lamented never being able to capture the squealing wheels and gap fillers in HD. Well just like with the Rockaway Ferry is was Sandy to the rescue once again, destroying the new station and pressing the 1905 technology back into service.

My first checkbox item was to use the railfanable window in the R62 to get front end video all the way around the loop. I had to split the video between two trains of course, but you can watch the whole thing here as I go from Rector to South Ferry and back again all without changing perspective.



Here we see R62 #1841 waiting for the few passengers that might arrive at 11pm.

The 102 gap filler signal illuminates when the fillers have extended.

The #103 gap filler. The South Ferry fillers are pneumatically operated using standard US&S pneumatic switch hardware. If you look closely you can spot the pneumatic piston.

Noisy 5 train squeals by on the inner loop while #1841 waits patiently for its departure time.



1905 station art. Much nicer than what was installed 100 years later and a lot more cost effective.

Gap filler control panel inside the dispatcher's office. While interlocked and signaled like any other appliances on the NYCS, the SF gap fillers stand apart from the regular signaling system. There are 5 distinct "fillers", one for each of the first 5 cars on an arriving train. Each of these in turn has three filler units that extend to meet the doors on an IRT dimension subway car. The filler panel has a unit lever for each of the per-car fillers, and each of the per-car fillers is connected to its own track circuit. Normal position is retracted and reverse is extended. Normally operation is fully automatic, but the dispatch staff can take manual control. I suspect the fillers automatically engage when the first five cars fill their track circuits and then disengage when the train edges forward over the insulated joint in front of the 102 signal.

Click for a larger version.

Dispatch office and exit to the Ferry terminal. The TA had done a remarkable job cleaning the station up for service.

Mind the Gap? Not here!

#1841 and the rest of its trainset disengage the fillers and depart South Ferry en route to the Bronx.




It was soon replaced by a new R62 trainset with #2475 in the lead.



Stay tuned for the last installment of this multi-subject trip as I finally get my ass to Boston. Even if I was a day late it turned out not to be a dollar short.