On Tuesday I caught the Akron Barberton Cluster Railway local to Ravenna. Wheeling & Lake Erie No. 302, a former Denver & Rio Grande Western GP40 still lettered for that railroad powered the train.
In the photos above the train is shown switching at Kent, heading to Ravenna and on the turn trip at Ravenna
Article and Photographs by Todd Dillon
Norfolk Southern reopened its Cleveland Line in Portage County on Wednesday just over a day after it was closed by a Tuesday night derailment.
Amtrak’s Capitol Limited resumed operating on Thursday morning between Cleveland and Pittsburgh.
Officials said there were no injuries in the derailment and no hazardous materials were involved.
Most of the derailed cars were auto racks, some of them carrying new Jeeps. Some cars carrying rock salt spilled their contents.
An NS spokesman said the train had four locomotives and 237 cars. It had originated at Conway Yard near Pittsburgh and was en route to Bellevue when the derailment occurred around 7 p.m. near Lake Street in Ravenna.
The NS spokesman said 22 cars derailed. No cause of the derailment has been given by railroad officials.
The derailment closed South Prospect Street (Ohio Route 44) for several hours and disrupted school bus service in the Ravenna school district.
Laura Hebert, superintendent of Ravenna City Schools, said a school bus serving the neighborhood was unable to pick up children for school.
Route 44 was reported to have been closed between Sandy Lake Road and Summit Road.
Amtrak’s westbound Capitol Limited that had departed Washington for Chicago on Tuesday afternoon turned back at Pittsburgh to become Train 30. The eastbound Capitol Limited departure of Tuesday evening was cancelled.
Nos. 29 and 30 were operating the length of their routes on Thursday. No. 30 was reported to have departed Alliance at 3:44 a.m., 39 minutes late.
The derailment was reported to the Ravenna Township Fire Department at 7:12 p.m. on Tuesday.
News reports quoted a resident of the Timber Run housing development as saying,”It sounded like a plane was about to crash into our houses.”
One resident who joined the crowd watching the cleanup said his boat had been destroyed in the derailment, but he was excited about the prospect of receiving a check from NS for it.
No injuries were reported after a Norfolk Southern train derailed Tuesday night near Ravenna.
A report by the Akron Beacon Journal said the derailment occurred around 7:45 p.m. and blocked Ohio Route 44 in Ravenna Township just south of Summit Road.
An online report indicated the derailment occurred at milepost 82.4 and involved train M0Q.
A statement released by the Potage County Office of Homeland Security and Emergency Management said 16 cars derailed.
No hazardous materials were involved. The cars were reported to be carrying rock salt and other materials.
Photographs posted online showed loaded auto rack cars having derailed.
“It sounded like a plane was about to crash into our houses,” a nearby Ravenna resident told the Beacon Journal.
A Portage County Sheriff’s Deputy at the derailment site who was questioning individuals said he had not found any eyewitnesses.
An online report said the train had 187 loads and 49 empties. The derailment blocked both tracks of the Cleveland Line.
Amtrak’s eastbound Capitol Limited did not operate Tuesday night. Reportedly, the westbound Capitol turned back at Pittsburgh to become No. 30.
The superintendent of the Ravenna school district tweeted that the derailment near Lake Street would affect the district’s ability to pick up some students on Wednesday.
“We will not be able to pick up students living along Prospect St. South of Summit Rd and in the Timber Run neighborhood. Other routes may be late! Stay tuned!” he said in a Twitter post.
Here are a pair of images of Baltimore & Ohio lGP40 locomotives in action. In the top image No. 4015 is in leading a trailer train at Ravenna on April 1, 1983. The unit was built in September 1971 and later was part of the CSX motive power roster.
In the bottom image B&O No. 3686 is shown in Shelby on July 26, 1980, leading a local. This locomotive was built in November 1966. It would later wind up working for the St. Louis Southwestern (Cotton Belt).
Photographs by Robert Farkas
The Akron Railroad Club’s annual longest day outing will be held this year in Ravenna.
The outing on Sunday, June 26 will feature trains on the Cleveland Line of Norfolk Southern and the New Castle Subdivision of CSX. The NS tracks cross over CSX in Ravenna on a bridge.
Attendees will observe the action at Diamond Street, Lake Street and other points nearby.
Some members plan to have breakfast that morning at Megan’s Family Restaurant at 266 W. Main St. in Ravenna.
The Ravenna outing is a first for the ARRC. Previous longest day outings have been held in Alliance, Bellevue, Marion, Fostoria and Deshler.
Baltimore & Ohio E8A No. 1449 is heading the westbound Diplomat near Ravenna, Ohio in the late 1960s/early 1970s.
Photograph by Robert Farkas
I was looking in my slide collection earlier this week with an emphasis on images made on the Cleveland Line of Norfolk Southern in the vicinity of Brady Lake and Ravenna when I ran across the image shown above.
Seeing it brought back a lot of memories of a late October day, Oct. 28, 2005, to be exact.
I was in my first year as president of the Akron Railroad Club. It was a Friday and the October meeting was that night in the Carriage House of the Summit County Historical Society.
Before the meeting Ed Ribinskas and I got in some late day railfanning around Ravenna.
As you can see in this image the fall foliage along the Cleveland Line east of Lake Street was at peak color although some of the trees had already lost most or all of their leaves.
We were there in late afternoon and fortunate to get two westbounds before the shadows completely covered the rails.
As it was, the shadows were rapidly moving in, which turned out to be a good thing by creating some dramatic contrast. Contrast helps to give an image visual tension, which increases its drama and interest.
It is noteworthy that as dramatic as these images are they are not the photographs I remember the most from this outing.
Those images were made several minutes later on the CSX New Castle Subdivision at Chestnut Street.
In the last direct sunlight of the day we caught a westbound with a BNSF leader. I framed it with a Baltimore & Ohio color position light signal and the block sign denoting the end and beginning of the Kent and Rave blocks.
The warm light on a BNSF “pumpkin” was, I thought at the time, the catch of the day.
CSX has long since dropped the use of blocks on the New Castle Sub and the CPLs have been gone for years. So those photos now make nice period pieces.
Curious as to who had the program that night I dug out the October 2005 Bulletin. The program was titled Now and Then with the “now” being presented by Marty Surdyk and the “then” being shown by his father, the late William Surdyk.
The photographs shown were made roughly 40 years apart and used different types of slide film.
Marty’s images were 35 mm slides shown in a Kodak Carousel projector.
He featured the Bessemer & Lake Erie, CSX in the Akron area, Marion, Berea and the Wheeling & Lake Erie around Spencer.
Bill’s images were 2.25-inch format slides shown in a 1950s era Goldie projector that could be fed one slide at a time. In Bill’s show were images from Berea, Marion and Akron among other locations.
The meeting minutes for October reported that a record 18 members went to the Eat ‘n Park in Cuyahoga Falls after the meeting for dessert, a late dinner or an early breakfast.
The next day ARRC members gathered again, this time in Berea to dedicate the Dave McKay memorial.
A week before the meeting, ARRC members had enjoyed an excursion on the Ohio Central between Dennison and Morgan Run. It was supposed to have been pulled by 2-8-0 Baldwin-built No. 33.
But the steamer was sidelined with mechanical issues. Instead, a Montreal Locomotive Works RS18 pulled the trip to Morgan Run while an OC FP7 powered the return trip.
What a month October 2005 was for the ARRC.
We’re feeling blue today so let the wayback machine take us to a time and place where blue locomotives were common. CR GE C39-8 No. 6006 is eastbound in Ravenna in July 1986. This unit would later be on the Norfolk Southern locomotive roster.
Photograph by Robert Farkas
Conrail SD60 No. 6812 leads an eastbound manifest freight in Ravenna in June 1986. It is passing the since removed former Pennsylvania Railroad passenger station.
Photograph by Robert Farkas
There is still some snow left on the tracks of the CSX New Castle Subdivision a day or two after a winter storm passed through the area in March 2008.
Shown is an eastbound auto rack train approaching the Diamond Street crossing in Ravenna.
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