21-01-31 PHOTOS: Churchman's Crossing

I travel the 95 corridor on a regular basis and in recent years have made a point to actually stop off at various rail points of interest along the route such as Edgewood, MD or Newark, DE. One location not far from the others, but totally off my radar was Churchman's Crossing, the Delaware owned SEPTA station between Wilmington and Newark used by a few peak period R2 trains since R2 service was extended in 2000. This set of photos covers my first visit to the station as well as the nearby CSX Wilsmere Yard and some additional action at BWI.

Churchmans Crossing could be reasonably considered to be an infill station between Wilmington and Newark, although it was built in conjunction with the SEPTA R2 extension to Newark. Built, owned and maintain by DART First State transit, it is similar in concept and construction to the DART Claymont Station that opened in 1998. Churchmans Crossing consists of a single low level platform on the east side of Amtrak's #1 track with duckboards reaching tracks 2 and 3 in case of contingency operation. 

With SEPTA service suspended south of Wilmington due to COVID, there was no need to staff the station with a security guard to yell at photographers. Although the station is pretty much in the middle of a field, it is reasonably adjacent to a large Medical and Corporate park as well as a few residential neighborhoods. Still, the lack of all-day service even in normal times is a major deterrent to anyone who might want to use the service to reach the nearby centers of employment.

The budget layout of the station was due to the plan to operate SEPTA trains in both directions exclusively on #1 track between RAGAN and DAVIS interlockings, keeping them out of the way of higher speed Amtrak trains on tracks 2 and 3. The station is adjacent to a vintage PRR era road bridge that provides back door access to the Delaware Park racetrack.

ADA access is provided by both an elevator and a little track lift located to the side of the platform's only staircase.

Amtrak service was pretty thin on this Saturday with only a single pair of Regionals bothering to show up. The northbound was powered by ACS-86 #614.

A perk of the station is the milepost 33 automatic signal location a fraction of a mile to the north.

I had better light for the southbound Regional headed by ACS-86 #624.

21-01-16 PHOTOS: Leaman Place

With not much to do for the long MLK Day weekend in 2021, I decided to fall back on my Amtrak Harrisburg Line theme from 2020 and check out the "new" LEAMAN interlocking in Leaman Place, PA, right down the road from where the Strasburg Railroad meets the old PRR Main Line. The last time I had visited LEAMAN was in 2007, before it had been re-signaled in the general 110mph and CTC upgrade program that was completed around 2010. The trip would provide a welcome break on a dreary January Saturday with not much else to do and would offer content from Amtrak Keystone service trains as well as whatever was running on the Strasburg RR. The entire set of photos from this trip can be found here ( mirror ).

Although not accessible from local roads, the picnic area at the Strasburg Railroad's "Paradise" station can be reached by traversing adjacent corn fields. As a Strasburg excursion run arrived on the scene I noticed that another railfan had the same idea, but set up their tripod down by the Yard Limit sign. 

Strasburg #89, a former Canadian National 2-6-0 Mogul, was performing the honors with a fairly long train to give passengers the ability to spread out.

Either through happenstance or good planning, the excursion was just in time to meet an eastbound Amtrak Keystone train with Metroliner Cab Car #9640 and ACS-86 #646.

The sun made an appearance while the crew set up for the run around.

CN #89 then passed by the trainset on the siding before backing up to couple on to the opposite end.