I sometimes wonder what Wheeling Tower in Bellevue looked like as late as the 1960s and 1970s.
At one time, it controlled diamonds over which a Wheeling & Lake Erie line to Toledo and a New York Central line to Milbury Junction crossed the Nickel Plate Road and Pennsylvania railroads here.
I’m not sure when these diamonds were removed. The ex-NYC was not conveyed the Conrail and was abandoned after the latter began operations on April 1, 1976.
The Norfolk & Western acquired the Nickel Plate in 1964 but in 1949 the NKP had acquired the W&LE. Yet the diamonds was removed sometime after the N&W arrived on the scene.
In the photo above, Norfolk Southern train 14Q is coming into Bellevue on the Toledo District, formerly the W&LE route to Toledo and making the turn to head into Moorman Yard.
The original W&LE tracks would have crossed to the right of the tower as you look at it and the NYC to the left.
Tags: Bellevue Ohio, Canadian National locomotives, CN locomotives, New York Central, Nickel Plate Road, Norfolk Southern, Pennsylvania Railroad, Railfanning in Bellevue Ohio, Wheeling & Lake Erie
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May 3, 2018 at 11:30 am |
Apparently the W&LE diamond over the NKP was removed sometime in the mid-to-late 1990’s, possibly as late as the early 2000’s.
March 25, 2019 at 10:50 am |
I hired out on the N&W railroad in 1969 at age 20 as a Tower Operator working off of the extra board. Wheeling tower in Bellevue was one four interlocking towers that I qualified to work at. The other three were in Toledo, Ohio, Ironville Tower, Manhattan Jct Tower, and Gould Tower. The railroad started closing these towers down due in the late 1980’s due advances in computers where train movements could be controlled many miles away. These were great jobs. I am not sure when the diamond was removed at Wheeling Tower.