26-02-08 PHOTOS: Post Road Branch

 For my 2025 visit to New York Capital Region I turned my attention south of the city to Amtrak's Post Road Branch and the former Conrail Boston Line to revisit some infrastructure I had not kept up on for over 15 years. Unfortunately actual encounters with train movements was rather slim so I have included additional photos from SS72 DEVON junction on the New Haven Line plus some MARC Camden Line activity so I hope you all find this worth your while. 

Albany can be considered the Harrisburg of the New York Central. A major hub located in an eastern state capitol that has to coordinate multiple flows of freight and passenger rail traffic. Located at the junction of the old New York and Hudson River, Mohawk and Hudson, Boston and Albany and West Shore Railroads this created quite a bottleneck in the downtown Albany area where all of these rail lines met. Operations were further complicated by a pair of swing span drawbridges and "stiff" (for the New York Central) grades on both sides of the Hudson Valley. All of these problems were solved by the 1924 Castleton Cutoff that provided a low grade freight route that completely bypassed Albany and Schenectady. The signature work of engineering was the high level Alfred H. Newman Smith bridge over the Hudson River Valley. The entire mile long bridge recently underwent a renovation that cleared the right of way, repaired the steel supports and re-pointed the concrete footings.

You can see some of the specific work that was carried out with replacement beams and gusset plates painted a lighter shade of brown and the new concrete also readily apparent. The new steel also used high strength bolts instead of hot rivets. 

The Smith Bridge features two steel truss spans over the Hudson River navigation channels, one of 404 feet and the other 610 feet.

Despite the renovation work, CSX did not use the opportunity to demolish the old base of SM tower which stood at the eastern end of the bridge where the connecting track to the Hudson Line branched off. Today this branch typically sees a daily overnight freight round trip to and from New York City.

It was here I caught the sole freight train of the trip, the cars making a bit of noise as they pounded the frog on the #3 switch at CP-SM.

 

After the construction of the Castleton Cutoff, the segment between Albany and the cutoff junction near North Chatham saw most of the freight traffic siphoned off. By the time of Amtrak passenger traffic was down to a single daily round trip and the bankrupt Penn Central went as far as to remove the 12 mile long track in an effort to cut costs forcing Amtrak trains to make a 7 mile backup move via the connection at SM tower. A lawsuit forced the restoration of the track which today is known as the Post Road Branch due to the proximity of the old Albany Post Road. Still only hosting the single round trip the track is maintained by Amtrak although still nominally owned by CSX. It is notable for its use of jointed rail good for 80mph and a low cost bi-directional signaling system that makes use of a 10-mile long automatic block with a distant signal at each end. Here we see both of these Conrail style signals at mileposts 188 and 197 (from Boston). 

The jointed rail has already been replaced at milepost 188 and can be seen laying on the ground waiting installation at milepost 197. Like with the BNSF Glorieta sub used exclusively by thee Southwest Chief, without the wear and tear of freight traffic, rails and other track components can last in service for over 40 years.

Due to a well known court case, the status of a home being "haunted" must be disclosed to potential buyers. On the flip side, a rundown house that is not considered haunted can use that fact as a selling point.

The next point of interest was the State Line tunnel near Boston Line milepost 165. Upon arriving we encountered Sperry Rail Service doodle-truck #921 performing a ultrasonic inspection for rail cracks. This unfortunately meant that there would be no regular train service for some time to come.

Contrary to popular belief, the former Boston and Albany State Line Tunnel does not run under the NY-MA state border, but exists through a ridgeline about a mile to the west in New York. First bored through in 1840, a second single track tunnel was added in 1912 to increase clearances. The 1840 tunnel was later abandoned in place when the Conrail Boston Line was single tracked around 1992. Today the old bore is known for the beautiful ice flows that form inside during the winter months. 

A moderate overnight snowfall dialed up the picturesque and while heading to a brewery in Hoosic Falls I stopped by CPF-445 on the old Boston and Maine. While the signals were replaced in the 2010's, the former B&M signal bridge still stands. The track to the right is the Vermont Rail System line to Bennington.

Evidence of the CP purchase of Kansas City Southern was in evidence at the Port of Albany with KCS road units sitting next to some CP geeps. The engines include KCS ES44AC #4722, KCS ET44AC #5009, and CP GP20C-ECO's #2228 and #2260.

Moving over to the New Haven Railroad, I stopped by Signaling Station #72 aka DEVON with the intent of catching a Waterbury train diverging from the NEC. My efforts were rewarded with CT Rail BL20GHM #125 with a 3-car shuttle train. As an extra bonus, Shoreliner I cab car #6123 was on the rear.

Unfortunately the location did not provide good angles of traffic on the NEC, this photo of Amtrak ACS-86 #617 being one of the better ones I could manage.

I had heard that a utility project had removed the trees around of Signaling Station #73, aka WOODMONT, and I was able to get photos of both it and an inbound train of M8's featuring #9264.

Moving down to MARC country I managed to catch the meeting of westbound MARC  #859 and eastbound train #856. Train 859 had single level cab car #7757 and MP36PH-3C #20 and Train 856 had MP36PH-3C #15 and split level cab car #8048. 

 

On a different evening I managed to catch three train movements in quick succession at the St Denis MARC station.  The first was a train of empty coal hoppers heading westbound on the CSX Old Main Line with ET44AC #3324, CM44AC #7008 and AC4400 #314 leading.  This was followed by westbound MARC Camden Line train 859 with single level cab car #7759 MP36PH-3C #25. Finally eastbound Camden Line train #954 arrived with MP36PH-3C #15 and split level cab car #8048, ie the exact same trainset I had previously caught at Dorsey.

That's all for now. Check back next time as I head out to New Cannan via the Metro North branch of the same name.