19-05-24 PHOTOS: West Slope Pickup

Over the summer of 2019 the clock was ticking on classic signaling on the PRR Main Line between Harrisburg and Pittsburgh.  While I had made multiple trips to document the old stuff, there were still a few accessible locations that I had either bypassed, failed to notice or simply screwed up the first time around.  Three of these were located on the famous West Slope rail heritage corridor between Gallitzin and South Fork with the third on the track 3 Slow Road near New Florence and the Seward generating complex.  You can find the full set of photos here (mirror).

 First stop was the popular railfan hangout at Lilly, PA.  While I had first visited this location just 5 months before, the weather had been blah, I discovered that some of the photos were a bit soft and I had generally missed a lot of angles. It was time for a re-do and the May weather did not disappoint with the MP 354 signal bridge all lit up with a Clear indication on tracks 1 and 2.  In terms of the re-signaling project I was about to get these and following photos about a week or two before they were taken out of service.

The source of the approach lighting was a loaded eastbound coal train on track #1 with NS C44-9W's #9610 and #9773 in the lead.

 

The trains bulk was such that two SD40E (rebuilt SD50) helper packs were attached with NS #6303, #6306, #6309 and #6325.

All 6 units were making a lot of noise as they struggled to get the ~10,000 ton train up the stiff grade.





Next stop was the Milepost 256.5 westbound signal bridge located halfway between the Cassandra cut and the eastbound signals at Jamestown Rd  This is one of the oldest style of PRR signal bridges that likely date from before 1920 and were originally fitted with semaphores. 

In the few minutes since I had stopped at Lilly, traffic had been thrown on the bi-directional center track #2 so both westbound signals were displaying Clear.  This specific signal bridge was still in its original four track single direction Rule 251 configuration.

The next signal is located in the town of South Fork and is an uncommon PRR pedestal type automatic signal serving as a distant to CP-W for trains coming off the South Fork Secondary.  While not on a Main Line main track, it is nevertheless given a Main Line milepost number of 265.6. 

While I was there an eastbound oil train showed up with NS SD70ACU #7251 and ES44AC #8146 in the lead .

As the tail end helper pack rolled by with SD40E's #6310 and #6317, they passed the tail end of a westbound doublestack intermodal train on track #2.

#6310 and #6317 pushing hard through South Fork.

While driving past the Seward generating station yard I snapped a windshield photo of two NS units that turned out to be SD80MAC's #7212 and #7201.  If I had known that the 80's would be sold off within a year I likely would have stopped  for some additional photos :-(

Between CP-C in Johnstown and CP-CONPIT, the former Conrail Pittsburgh Line takes two routes with track 1 and 2 on the south bank of the Conemaugh River and track 3 on the north bank.  Passenger traffic generally sticks to tracks 1 and 2 as the track 3 alignment takes about an extra 15 minutes to traverse.  Still, tracks 3 is a legit part of the Pittsburgh Line with its own position light signals like the MP 287 intermediate mast shown here in the shadow of the Conemaugh Generating station.

Next stop was the town of Blairsville, PA for some ice cream and to check out the monster PRR era infrastructure that replaced the original at-grade alignment through town with a grade separated two track trench. The old PRR passenger station sits between the old alignment, which is now an industrial track, and the new trench.

Leaving town I saw that someone had put Trump signs in the old abandoned Blairsville High School, which, intentional or not, is wonderful commentary about the effect of his administration on the country.

I'll wrap things up with this photo of a wildflower. Maybe someone out there can help me identify the species.

Next week its back to the Baltimore area for some DC Metro, MARC and Amtrak photos.