45 Years Later at Stone Road

With the excursions of Nickel Plate Road 2-8-4 No. 765 on the Cuyahoga Valley Scenic Railroad limited to all departing from Rockside Road station and advancing only as far as Vaughn Road due to the river bank erosion north of Boston Mill, I decided to pick out a one-and-done location.

I picked Stone Road about a mile south of the Rockside Road station.

 I chose that spot for several reasons. Years ago it was a through road between Brecksville Road on the west, crossing the tracks (ex-Baltimore & Ohio) at river level, crossing the river on a truss bridge, crossing the Ohio & Erie Canal, and then intersecting with Canal Road on the east end.

The top image was made in July 1977 with Cuyahoga Valley Line (ex-Grand Trunk Western) 4070 approaching. There were even crossing signals here.

Many years ago the bridge over the river needed replacement. It was demolished and never replaced. Stone Road still comes in from the west and dead ends at the railroad.

Photographs two and three were made on Saturday shortly after the 10 a.m. departure of NKP 765.

I also guessed the parking area at the Brecksville station would be closed off due to this being the only location for the photo runbys.

I suggested to Jeff Troutman, who was riding with me, that we drive past to see. I was right so then I suggested that we should visit the new visitor center at Boston Mill.

I was there twice last year, once with Marty Surdyk and once with Ursula.

We also saw the damaged riverbank area and from what we could see that it would still be a while for the repairs to be completed.

After stopping at the visitor center, we headed for lunch at McDonalds. About noon we went down to Old Rockside to await the return of the steam excursion.

The train showed up right at 12:30 p.m. The bottom photo is the train at the boarding site. As you can see some dark clouds were moving in.

Once the passengers had detrained, the train moved to north of Old Rockside. We got a few photos of 765. As we got back to my car the heavens let loose. It lasted a few minutes but we were done anyway. It was not an all-day outing, but still an enjoyable one.

Article and Photographs by Edward Ribinskas

Tags: Cuyahoga Valley Line 4070, Cuyahoga Valley Scenic Railroad, Edward Ribinskas photograhs, Grand Trunk Western 4070, Nickel Plate 765, Nickel Plate Road 765, Nickel Plate Road No. 765, NKP 765, NKP 765 on CVSR, Steam excursion trains, steam locomotives