It's always been interesting how few tower videos there are compared with like aircraft stuff where Youtube can not only provide videos of every approach, but also how to start up and steal most types of commercial airliner as well xD I guess part of it was that much of the towers vanished before the smartphone revolution, but it's still interesting given how many fans are also railroaders and how it was clear since the 1980's that all the 1930's tech was going to vanish sooner rather than later.
Sometimes it turns out that these sorts of videos may just be hiding in plain sight. One such nondescript channel goes by the name of M. P. Hicks and contains all sorts of general VHS-quality railfan content from around the globe. However Mr. Hicks also appears to have been a railroad dispatcher and was able to fenagle all sorts of cab rides and tower visits. Here we see a 1990 video showing a Conrail run from Pavonia to Abrahms Yard via Arsenal. Of course in 1990 this route had not yet been separated from Amtrak so SHORE, NORTH PHILADELPHIA, ZOO and ARSENAL towers were all manned and were controlling the movement. Moreover, even the pure Conrail parts had vintage signaling and some closed towers were still standing, like NORRIS.
In this video we have a METRA cab ride on the MILW-West line that ends with a visit to TOWER A-5.
In this video with no description and a completely non-rail related title, are embedded 7 minutes of footage showing the operation of an 80's vintage computerized dispatching system complete with a lamp based model board display!
Mr M. P. Hicks has scores of videos uploaded, but there isn't always a good way to find it without skimming through them all. Of course some are explicitly labeled as cab rides like this one on the Chicago to Milwaukee MILW route that starts with a slow tour of the vintage CTC machine in the Chicago CP dispatch office.
Anyway, happy hunting and enjoy the ride :-)
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