Remember the Leaning Tower of Nova?

Nova Tower has been gone for several years now, but in its final days it was a sought-after photo prop because it had a distinctive lean.

The tower was located on the CSX New Castle Subdivision in Nova, Ohio. It had been closed for years when the above photograph of a westbound CSX coal train was made on Oct. 17, 2010.

At one time Nova tower controlled signals and a crossover. Going back even further the Lorain, Ashland & Southern crossed the Baltimore & Ohio in Nova at grade. In B&O days it was known as VN Tower.

The tower has received minimal, if any maintenance, after its closing and it was somewhat surprising that it lasted as long as it did.

Nova Tower was razed on Nov. 22, 2013 and some of its components were moved by truck to a Utah railroad museum which said it would use them to create an interlocking tower.

Photograph by Craig Sanders

What’s Roger Seen Lately?

Wheeling 7005 on Z642 in Akron on July 17.

Some out of the ordinary motive power has operated through Northeast Ohio lately and if you missed it, Akron Railroad Club member Roger Durfee has you covered.

Roger caught up with those moves and sends along some images of them along with a few routine operations that he captured.

Photographs by Roger Durfee

NS 20E (detour move) meets two tied down stack trains at Bellevue on July 8.

Clean shot of NS No. 34 at Bellevue on July 8.

KCS 3909 at Akron with Q292 on July 11.

FEC 104 at Sandusky on July 8.

BNSF 759 on Q277 at Cuyahoga Falls on June 15.

 

Good Locomotive, Bad Light

I had time to get in some afternoon railfanning before the May Akron Railroad Club meeting so I took my camera with me during a hike on the Portage Hike and Bike Trail near Kent.

I also took my scanner and sat on bench on the trail next to the CSX New Castle Subdivison and waited for a train to show up.

In my experience, afternoons can be slow on the New Castle Sub. and today was no exception.

There was a track gang at work somewhere nearby and approaching trains had to call the foreman on the radio to get authority through the work zone.

I thought I heard a train identifying itself as Q015, a stack train, calling the foreman. That was good news because I really wanted to get a westbound coming around a curve and into some good later afternoon light.

I got up and got into position. Soon I heard the rumbling of prime movers of an approaching train.

But it seemed to be coming from behind me. It got louder and finally I looked around to discover that I had actually heard the Q016 approaching.

The good news was that on the point was a beautiful Southern Belle of Kansas City Southern. Such units are not unheard of in Northeast Ohio, but not common either.

The bad news was the the lighting was unfavorable. I made the photograph anyway even though I didn’t have much time to get a better composition.

Some days are like that. Not far behind the Q016 was an eastbound auto rack and stack train. I never did see a westbound during my time on the trail that afternoon.

Just Another ‘Routine’ Day in Marion

One highlight of my day in Marion in early March was this Kansas City Southern “Belle” helping to pull the Q106.

Every time that I plan a day railfan outing I’m always hoping for something out of the ordinary to occur.

Typically, I hope for something other than the same old, same old in motive power or train consists.

By that standard, my outing to Marion in early March was pretty average. Norfolk Southern didn’t send any heritage or special tributes through town during the nine hours that I was there.

No foreign units led any of the 30 trains that I logged. There were foreign units trailing in three motive power consists, one of which was the Q106, a run-through intermodal train from the Kansas City Southern.

The second unit in the motive power consist of that train was a KCS Southern Belle. I would have liked for it to have been leading. I would liked even more for that motive power set to have gone back west that afternoon, but it didn’t.

Motive power matters aside, I considered the outing to be a success. Train traffic was steady throughout the day. CSX was its usual hit and miss, but it provided 12 trains, although nothing ran west on the CSX Columbus Subdivision.

It took longer than I expected for the temperatures to warm to a comfortable feeling, but the skies were mostly sunny. That alone can make it a good day.

I had not been in Marion since last August when I attended Summerail so I wasn’t aware of a major change that has improved photography there.

CSX has removed the poles on the south side of the Mt. Victory Subdivision. One of those used to block the sight lines of photographs made from AC Tower.

A stub of a pole by the diamonds of the Sandusky District of Norfolk Southern with the Mt. Victory Sub holds station identifier signs for NS. It looks kind of funny, but it is what it is.

Here is a selection of some of my better images of the day.

Article and Photographs by Craig Sanders

The first “foreign” locomotive that I spotted was a BNSF unit trailing a CSX leader on a westbound auto rack train on the Mt. Victory Sub.

An eastbound NS coal train approaches the junction with CSX.

CSX grain train G646 is about to rattle the diamonds as it rumbles eastward on the Columbus Sub.

Without poles along the CSX tracks, the sight lines from AC Tower are now open for shooting eastbound trains passing Marion Union Station on the Mt. Victory Sub. The train is the Q008.

Remember that pole that you used to have to shoot around from the steps of AC Tower? I can’t say that I miss it.

An NS engineer gives a wave to railfans in Marion.

 

Colorful Outing on CSX

I had to toss in a little BNSF orange into the Crayola box. Here is a westbound at Attica Junction.

 

I made a trip to the Willard area the other weekend and was treated to quite the color variety along the CSX main. In no particular order here is what I was able to get.

Photographs by Roger Durfee

Road slug looking nice and clean.

A remote GP-38-2 works the west end of Willard as that NS/CREX set we saw earlier cools it’s wheels in the distance.

An in your face eastbound at Boughtonville.

CSX 8357, Clinchfield 3023 in a former life, leads an eastbound mixed freight into Willard.

A K train departed with a Kansas City Southern retro Belle leader, seen first at the Boughtonville Road crossing.

. . . and then at the Route 13 crossing on the former Big 4 near Greenwich.

As I arrived in Willard an eastbound was departing with NS and CEFX for power. Let’s see, the first two CSX moves had NS leaders, what a way to start the day.

I chased this train to get multiple shots of this WP covered hopper.

A westbound is stopped at the 191 signals just east of Greenwich in the last light of day.

The Belles of New London

CSX train Q377 with four new Kansas City Southern locomotives in tow passes the reservoir west of New London on Saturday afternoon.

Word filtered out Saturday afternoon that CSX train Q377 had something special in its consist: four new Kansas City Southern locomotives wearing the striking Southern Belle livery.

I had been out with fellow Akron Railroad Club member Roger Durfee trying to get some “winter” photographs when we got word about the Q377. The clouds were starting to roll in from the southwest and Roger had considered packing it in and heading for home as it seemed to be getting darker by the second.

But there were still blue skies to the northeast and perhaps we could intercept the Q377 up by New London before the high pressure system moved out.

That turned out to be a good move because there were some breaks in the clouds and still nice sunshine in the New London area.

The Q377 was following traffic that included a tanker train (K011) and a stack train. The dispatcher informed the Q377 that it would cross over to Track No. 1 at CP 47 in New London and then would be waiting at CP 54 (Greenwich) for a train to come up the single track of the former Big Four and move east onto the New Castle Subdivision of the former Baltimore & Ohio.

The latter would give us the opportunity to get over to Greenwich in time for another photograph of the Belles.

After recording the Q377 in Greenwich, we headed back to Akron, our day’s work done.

Article and Photographs by Craig Sanders

The low angle sunlight reflects off the lettering on the flank of No. 4813,

These Belles will probably be interchanged to their new owner in St. Louis.

After waiting for a while for opposing traffic to clear at Greenwich, the Belles were on their way again.

The Belle of Marion

The Akron Railroad Club had its annual longest day outing this past Sunday. This year’s Ohio hotspot that we visited was Marion.

The catch of the day was the inbound Q106, a run-through train from Kansas City that originates on the Kansas City Southern. This train hauls containers to the Schneider National intermodal terminal on the east side of Marion.

Some of the containers, though, are shuttled from Marion to the CSX intermodal facility at North Baltimore, Ohio.

The Q106 usually arrives in Marion in the wee hours of the morning, but it was running late on this day for some reason, arriving in Marion at 10:04 a.m.  This was much to the delight of myself, Marty Surdyk and Todd Vander Sluis. We were the first club members to arrive, getting to the Marion Union Station at 8:29 a.m.

We’ll have a further report on the longest day later this week.

Photographs by Craig Sanders

CSX Changes Q106/Q107 Schedules

During the past year, many railfan photographers have been chasing CSX trains Q106 and Q107 because those trains often have Kansas City Southern power. The trains originate/terminate on the KCS and had been operating to the CSX North Baltimore, Ohio, intermodal terminal.

The trains had operated between St. Louis and Ridgeway, Ohio, via Indianapolis. Between Ridgeway and Galatea the trains took the former Toledo & Ohio Central route. At Galatea, the trains got on the former Baltimore & Ohio’s Chicago-Pittsburgh mainline to reach North Baltimore.

That all changed recently with the Q106/Q107 now originating and terminating in Marion, where Schneider National maintains an intermodal terminal.

Field reports indicate that Q106/Q107 are now operating on their previous schedules to Marion of arriving  in the early morning hours and departing between 7 and 9 p.m.

However, the reports indicate that a shuttle train between Marion and North Baltimore has been operating with the motive power that comes in on the Q106. The shuttle train, the Q109, reportedly departs Marion for North Baltimore not long after the arrival of the Q106 and returns to Marion in daylight hours, typically arriving around midday.

The shuttle train carries the Q109 symbol in both directions.

CSX recently installed a connection in the northeast quadrant of the diamond at Ridgeway that enables trains bound from Marion to North Baltimore or vice versa to directly switch from the former Big Four line from Marion to the former T&OC route.

Previously, trains operating between Marion and North Baltimore had to make a backup move at Ridgeway. The switches for the new connection are now hand-thrown.