Jersey Mike's Rail Adventures: 23-02-11 PHOTOS: Albany Jct

Friday, February 10, 2023

23-02-11 PHOTOS: Albany Jct

As the years pass it has been getting harder and harder to find new signaling in the New York Capitol Region to cover. This has been both due to be success in covering said signaling and the ongoing march of replacements. Efforts to tackle Amtrak Hudson Line surveys via day trips from the NY Metro had only gotten me up to Milepost 110, with some gaps. Day trips working south from Albany had similarly only gotten me to Milepost 125. However after mode shifting my Albany trips in the Covid era from train to car I was able to fill in most of the remaining locations leaving my 2023 up in the air. Now in hindsight I should have hit up some locations on the old B&M Main Line, but instead I looked west to CPF-499 on the former D&H route. This is where SMS lines Albany Division interchanges with NS and is notable for its fairly recent vintage searchlight signaling. I also found one additional location at Hudson Line Milepost 118 and went back to check on what was up with CP-SK and related signals near Selkirk, NY. Lastly to fill things out will be a selection of DC and Baltimore area photos taken on an adjacent weekend. The full set of photos can be found here ( mirror ).

Kicking things off we find the Hudson Line Milepost 118 intermediate signal located adjacent to a park at the mouth of the Stockport Creek. The NY Central searchlight signaling north of Hudson, NY was largely replaced during the Conrail era, but with that now 25 years in the past and need for photographic preservation has only increased. Here Amtrak P32AC-DM #709 passes the location with an Empire Service train.

Amtrak's current baseline Empire Service offers 60-120 minute frequencies between New York and Albany. That creates frequent opportunities to catch multiple trains in a single stop. Here a southbound run with P32AC-DM #715 splits the MP 118 signals with Approach still showing on the track 1 signal for the previous train. While fairly homogenous from a signaling perspective, the 110mph section only begins at Milepost 125, where freight trains exit the line via the Schodack Branch.

The Stockport Creek truss bridge showed the New York Central's foresight to make the bridge pylons capable of supporting a 4-track configuration. Unfortunately due to declines in traffic the northernmost 4-track segment ended at Milepost 93 in Barrytown.

To reach this and other northern Hudson Line locations the Rip Van Winkle Bridge allows one to transfer from the Thruway to the east side of the Hudson River.

CPF-499 on the former Delaware and Hudson Main Line in Dealenson, NY sits at the junction with the former Albany Branch (right) that would continue on past the Colonie Shoppes before terminating at the B&M interchange at Mechanicville. Today the route. Today the branch is operated as far as Voorheesville by SMS Lines with the remainder of the branch being abandoned. The Main Line, on the other hand, is now the purview of Norfolk Southern, who bought the route from Canadian Pacific. It is part of a logical Main Line set up by the Guilford Rail system running between central Main (Mp 0) and Sunbury, PA (MP 715) back when the Guilford controlled the D&H.

CPF-499 is also located at the north end of a 4-mile controlled siding and is configured as a "Conrail Crossover" that functions with 2 switches instead of 4 at the cost of capacity.

Canadian Pacific was one of the last users of traditional electro-mechanical searchlight signals and continued to install new examples on the D&H Main Line up into the 2000's. Both the southbound main track mast and northbound gantry are examples of these latter day searchlight installations. Here a Clear signal indicates the approach of a northbound train on the siding track. Low track speeds allow both main routes through the interlocking to rate a Clear signal.

The Clear signal turned out to be for an approaching NS intermodal train led by SD60E #6954, AC44C6M #4462 and C44-10W #7569.

The lfred H. Smith Memorial Bridge was constructed by the New York Central in 1924 as part of its Selkirk Yard project to bypass the congested Albany terminal area. It allows for both Boston Line and Hudson Line freight to rise up and cross the Hudson on a non-movable high level bridge. In the last few years CSX undertook a structural revitalization project that replaced many of the steel crossmembers and gusset plates on the viaduct portions of the bridge. This is the southernmost crossing of the Hudson River since the 1974 fire took the Poughkeepsie Bridge out of service.

Today the western end of the bridge marks the transition between Conrail style and Seaboard style signaling. This demarcation was previously located west of CP-SK, but that interlocking's recent re-signaling forced the change.