23-10-07 PHOTOS: Ohio 251

Starting in 2021 I initiated a side quest to get photos of all of the PRR Position Lights on the lower end of the Cleveland Line between Rochester, PA and Yellow Creek, OH. This line provides an alternate routing between Alliance, OH and Conway Yard and was cobbled together from a mash up of older PRR lines with a majority of the miles being unsignaled territory. However the eastern portion was once the PRR's double track line down the Ohio River and because dangerous through cargo can be sent via the primary Fort Wayne Line, the eastern Cleveland Line is PTC exempt. This means that it's single direction ABS position lit signaling system has survived largely intact. In October 2023 I completed my mission to document all of the vintage signals and once against stopped off at Conway Yard to get some train content for the people who like that. The full set of photos can be found here ( mirror ).

The first stop was in Wellsville, OH, 22 miles from the start of the Cleveland Line at CP-ROCHESTER. The westbound color light mast was installed when CP-YELLOW CREEK was re-signaled.

The second stop was at milepost 19 in East Liverpool, OH where one can get a sense of the priority NS gives this line as some of the rail dated from the 1940's.

The third and final location was at milepost 16 in the town of East End where I saw this little guy enjoying the morning sun.

Heading back past Conway Yard I passed by NS GP33ECO #6726 with road slug #659 near CP-FREEDOM.

Also working the west end of the yard was a sibling set with #6730 and slug #660.

Towards the middle of the yard was GP40-2 #3055 and road slug #751.

There was all sorts of neat stuff in the power storage track near the shoppe complex. This included SD70M-2 #2776, C44-9W #9738, SD70ACU #7269 along with GP40-2 #3056, SD40E #6334, high hood GP38-2 #5244 and one of 5 GP59ECO's #4655.

Upon reaching the EAST CONWAY overlook, I was just in time to catch a full length manifest train shoving westbound into one of the Conway Yard receiving tracks. Power on the opposite end consisted of NS AC44C6M #4231 and ES44AC #8160.

Based on seeing how a route was lined through EAST CONWAY interlocking, I was expecting another manifest train led by C40-10W #7562 to be the next out of the gate, however another westbound showed up on track #3 with AC44C6M #4503 and proceeded to wait at the EAST CONWAY cantilever signal.

At this point I was called back to the hotel where my friend was staying so he could get on with the primary reason for the trip, however on the way out of town at the end of the weekend I managed to catch a Bessemer and Lake Erie ore train crossing the Allegheny River Bridge with pairs of CN SD70M-2's on each end.

That's all for now. Next time I'll be back with some SEPTA action at Exton.