No Injuries in B&P Pennsylvania Derailment

No injuries were reported in a Monday derailment of a Buffalo & Pittsburgh train in West Mahoning Township in Indiana County, Pennsylvania.

News reported indicted a locomotive and 17 cars derailed. All of the cars were reported to be empty or containing such non-hazardous materials as cardboard or scrap metal.

The derailment blocked a grade crossing that was cleared by Tuesday when the line reopened.

B&P is owned by Genesee & Wyoming and has 728 miles in New York and Pennsylvania.

The derailment site is about 50 miles northeast of Pittsburgh.

I Always Looked for the Springville Station

Over the past 40 plus years I’ve visited the Arcade & Attica Railroad either by myself, with family members, or with friends. I’m guessing I’ve visited the A&A at least 15 times.

On all of those trips I’ve passed through Springville, New York, on New York Route 39.

I always watched for the crossing of the Buffalo, Rochester & Pittsburgh (Baltimore & Ohio) railroad line.

In the route’s last years it was owned by Genesee & Wyoming’s Buffalo & Pittsburgh. 

During the years of my travels to the A&A, the Springville station was a highlight and is still intact and in use, although not as a railroad station.

It has been restored and remains in very good condition.

I’ve read conflicting stories of when the last train ran and when the track was ripped up.

A few stories I found say the last train was in 1996 and was possibly pulled by Milwaukee Road 4-8-4 No. 261. These reports say the rail was removed around 2010.

The PCC coffee shop called A Streetcar Named Dessert was added in the late 1990s and remained in business until 2011.

The car is former Toronto Transit Commission No. 4434. Based on what I’ve read, the PCC was possibly scrapped after it was removed.

All of the photographs that accompany this post were made on June 1, 2008.

Photographs by Edward Ribinskas

Still Some Fall Foliage Out There

With another 70-degree weather and sunny day I railfanned eastern Ohio and Western Pennsylvania, there was still some fall color to be found. In the top image a Youngstown & Southeastern train climbs south from Youngstown.

In the middle image, a CSX coal train is at Wampum, Pennsylvania, while in the bottom photograph a Buffalo & Pittsburgh coal train is also at Wampum.

Photographs by Todd Dillon

2 Pa. Short Lines Get Safety Awards

Two Pennsylvania short line railroads have received President’s Safety Awards from the American Short Line and Regional Railroad Association.

Honored in the eastern region were the Buffalo & Pittsburgh,  and the York Railway Company.

The awards recognize railroads that achieved the lowest accident frequency rate based on 2019 Federal Railroad Administration data that is categorized based on the number of injury-free man hours worked.

Winners of the award will be recognized during the ASLRRA’s virtual Connections convention to be held Oct. 5-9.

Consol Eyes Getting out of Coal Mine Business

A Pennsylvania company that operates coal mines in the southwest corner of the state is considering getting out of the coal business in order to focus on its natural gas  initiatives.

Consol Energy said it may sell its coal mines as early as this year or spin them off into a entity separate from Consol.

Consol Chief Financial Officer David Khani told investors that the company lost more than $320 million loss during the fourth quarter, much of it due to declining coal business.

Among the Consol holdings in Pennsylvania are the Bailey, Enlow Fork and Harvey mines.

Consol is the largest shipper using the former Monongahela Railway, which hosts trains of CSX, Norfolk Southern and the Buffalo & Pittsburgh.

With an annual production capacity of more than 11 million tons of coal, the Bailey mine is said to be the highest capacity train loadout facility in the East with the capability of handling multiple unit trains simultaneously.

Consol is based in Cecil township near Pittsburgh.

Indiana, Pennsylvania Short Line Honored

Short line railroads in Indiana and Pennsylvania were recently honored by the American Short Line and Regional Railroad Association for their efforts to design and enact innovative and successful marketing initiatives.

The Indiana Rail Road was cited for its partnership with Canadian National to provide direct intermodal service from the West Coast, extending its intermodal markets into southern Indiana and the Ohio Valley.

INRD invested $2.5 million to upgrade facilities, including construction of a two-track intermodal pad and a five-acre container yard at its Senate Avenue Terminal.

The facility is open six days a week and is within a day’s drive of 80 percent of U.S. consumers.

Containers move from Shanghai, China, to Indianapolis via the Port of Prince Rupert, British Columbia, in 21.5 days on average, which is the fastest overall transit time in the industry.

The service handled 12,563 containers in 2014 and 17,233 containers in 2015. CN and INRD expect to move 18,000 containers in 2016.

The Nittany & Bald Eagle, and the Buffalo & Pittsburgh teamed up with Norfolk Southern to move lime pellets from Graymont Lime at Pleasant Gap, Pennsylvania, to the Homer City Generating Station at Homer City, Pennsylvania.

The lime has transformed the plant from one of the nation’s dirtiest coal-fired power plants to a model of how such power plants can economically reduce pollution.

The three railroads cover the 190-mile haul with 45-car trains operating on a three-and-a-half day schedule.

The service is expected to deliver more than 3,000 cars annually of lime.

Reading & Northern’s latest “Rapid Response” example is its rehabilitation of the Old Forge Warehouse near Scranton, Pennsylvania.

The facility is used to move wood pulp to a large paper mill. The warehouse needed to be located where the wood pulp could be delivered on a next-day basis.

More than 350 carloads were handled during the first six months of operation.

“The four railroads we honored for the 2015 work are risk takers in the very best sense of the word. They work daily to bring new customers to their lines with reliable connections, creative use of real estate assets and flexible service offerings. And in the end, they keep small towns and small shippers connected to the national railroad system,” said Linda Bauer Darr, president of the ASLRRA. “Their success is the result of a commitment to never standing still and never fearing change.”

Pa. Short Line Extends Track for Limestone Mine

The SEDA-COG Joint Rail Authority and the Nittany & Bald Eagle Railroad will build a track to serve a limestone mine.

The authority said in a news release that limestone from the mine will help the Homer City Generating Station become one of the cleanest coal-burning plants in the nation. Lime is used in scrubbers that reduce the emissions of power plants.

Graymont Limited mines high-grade limestone from the Valentine formation that will be used in the scrubbers at the Homer City power plant.

The new track extends from the end of the Pleasant Gap Industrial Track and will ensure sufficient railroad track capacity for additional lime shipments.

Each lime train must be in blocks of 45 with siding space for both a loaded and unloaded car set. The Graymont mine lacked adequate track space for the Homer City business.

A new yard was built to tie into new tracks that Graymont built on its property.

The lime trains will move from Nittany & Bald Eagle to Norfolk Southern and then to the Buffalo & Pittsburgh for final delivery to the power plant.

When These Locomotives Were Still Working

Akron Railroad Club member Todd Dillon dipped into his archives to pull out some image of Buffalo & Pittsburgh SD45 locomotives. He reports that these units have since been cut up at LTEX. They are shown here in service in happier times.

Photographs by Todd Dillon

Trackside Happenings and ‘Office’ Views

I stopped along Westinghouse hill after a meeting last week. Norfolk Southern No. 9914 is westbound past a little remaining color with downtown Cleveland in the background. NS 2743 is about to block my view of a boat out in Lake Erie.

In a view “from my office”, the circus train heads west through CP 102 as we wait on Main 1 and another job waits in the Twin storage.

Also shown is damage at Drawbridge Tower from super storm Sandy. Winds clocked at 85mph blew out several windows and bent some of the trim.

Finally, here is what remains of three Buffalo & Pittsburg SD45s at LTEX. These came in and went straight to the back lot to be cut up.

Photographs by Roger Durfee