LENOX and WILLOWS Towers Close

In a devastating blow to St Louis area rail history and living examples of General Railway Signal Co technology, I just learned that both LENOX and WILLOWS towers closed in the later part of 2018.  LENOX was a former Big Four tower operated by Union Pacific between Granite City and Alton and WILLOWS was operated by Kansas City Southern.

LENOX tower was built in 1924 with an 80 lever GRS Model 2 interlocking machine. It eventually passed from the former New York Central to the Chicago and Alton (owned by a succession of other railroads) to finally the Union Pacific in 1996.  As late as 2016 the future of the lower looked bright as no funding was available to rebuild the plant as part of the Illinois High Speed Rail Lincoln Corridor.  However it appeared that Union Pacific had grown tired of looking for a state financed rebuild and settled for a simple CTC automation.

 The real bummer is that I am scheduled to travel the Texas Eagle route for the first time in early 15 years at the end of this month and was really looking forward to get some reasonable photos of LENOX's other features such as the single slip switch and old B&O style CPL signals.  Latest report is that the tower is still standing and the lights are still on, but nobody is home :-(

WILLOWS tower, built in 1903 and equipped with a 112-lever, pre-GRS Taylor Signal Co Model 2 interlocking machine, was one of those I thought would be around for some time to cone due to the intersection of 4 lines with 6 diamonds and 5 competing railroads (NS, TRRA, CP, KCS and CSX).  Well I guess I was wrong :-(  Word is that Kansas City Southern is looking to donate the vintage interlocking machine to the science museum co-located with the Kansas City Union Station.

These latest closures leave only one or two examples of either the GRS or Taylor Model 2 interlocking machines left in the North American rail network.  My cursory count gives me three in Chicago (JB, LAKE ST, 16TH ST) and two more in New Orleans (East and West BRIDGE JCT).