LIRR NASSAU Tower Faces Demolition Soon

Despite the efforts of preservationists, both the Long Island Rail Road's NASSAU interlocking tower and the adjacent 1910 substation building will soon be demolished to make way for the third track and a kiss-and-ride drop off loop.  Current scuttlebutt is that this is set to take place within the next 30 days.

Built in 1923 as a mechanical plant, the flat junction between the LIRR Main Line and the Oyster Bay branch has become a major bottleneck in recent years.  The new third track is being constructed south of the existing Main Line due to the divergence of the Oyster Bay branch to the north so demolition or relocation of the tower was inevitable and the MTA ultimately chose the former.

The flat junction also involves a grade crossing and is in an area of poor drainage, requiring the whole plant to be dug our and re-graded on an almost yearly basis.  It will be interesting in what the final configuration will be.

As was seen with the Ronkonkoma double tracking project, the existing position light signals between QUEENS and DIVIDE will likely be removed and replaced with Reduced Aspect dwarfs.

How the interlocking will be operated is a bit less clear.  It is likely that the NASSAU territory between QUEENS and DIVIDE on the Main Line and the entire Oyster Bay branch will be giver to a new dispatcher at Jamaica.  However I believe that DIVIDE tower had alternate control of at least the Main Line portion of NASSAU's territory so until the dust settles with the third track, the LIRR might just wheel in a second office chair there.  It is also not clear what will be done about the NASSAU train order station as orders are frequently hooped up to Osyter Bay trains for various reasons.  

I was personally able to visit NASSAU in 2007 and again in 2016 and I feel confident enough in my documentation that feel no reason to brave the NYC COVID hot zone to rush back up there.  The only exception is the pneumatic switch machine used for the NASSAU movable point diamond.  If anyone heads out there please get as many photos as you can as a work crew thwarted my 2016 attempt.

As you can see I have some inside photos of NASSAU, but I plan to do a full interlocking write-up once the new configuration is in place so I won't need to do a followup.  Until that point I'll probably work on getting QUEENS out. 

Reading and Northern Kicks a Field Goal

It's been over a year since my last Reading and Northern signaling project report.  Since that time Rule 261 CTC is in effect from just north of the North Reading yard at RICK to Port Clinton and then again from north of the Port Clinton yard complex at CP-CLINT possibly all the way to the Lehigh Junction at COAL.  A lot of this was indicated in the Winter 2018/2019 report, but one new development is a new interlocking at the MP 78.5 West Hamburg location has been named "MULLER" after Reading and Northern owner Andy Muller.

Although there has been some modern style hardware used in the overall project, at MULLER the R&N signal department managed to source some period correct GRS Model G tri-light heads for the northbound mast, possibly from the recent Reading area signal replacements. 

The R&N also dug up another US&S H-style bracket mast that was popular with the Reading.  This would be their second bracket mast with the first being erected at Tamaqua in 2017.  Although neither use Reading style signal heads (specifically US&S style TRs), I was told that this was original Reading hardware unearthed on R&N property or obtained from NS. 

However the second H bracket appears to have been in a less complete state than the Tamaqua bracket as more of the structure appeared to be modern replacements including all of the base.  Hats off to the R&N staff for rebuilding this rare style of mast when a replacement could have probably been purchased for less money. 

You can see how the restored bracket compares with an abandoned example out of service example on the defunct Reading Newtown Branch.

MD and KY Survivor B&O CPLs To Fall

Two examples of B&O Color Position Light signals that held on after re-signaling projects felled all of their neighbors, will finally meet the wrath of standardization.  The first are GREENBELT interlocking on the Capitol Sub in suburban Maryland and the others are at OB (Ohio Bridge) CABIN on the Cincinnati Terminal Sub in Covington, KY.

GREENBELT was installed in 1992 to support a new intermodal MARC station.  High level platforms at GREENBELT would make the station incompatible with CSX freight clearances so two station tracks were installed within the limits of a new interlocking.  CSX was still in the practice of installing legacy signaling at the time and GREENBELT was therefore given modern style B&O CPLs in addition to other interlockings being installed in the DC area to support CTC and increased MARC service.  In 2012 CSX, backed by some amount of government funding, embarked on another re-signaling spree in the DC area and ripped out all of the CPLs save for those at GREENBELT, probably due to some disagreement over how much the state should pay as the interlocking's sole use was to support MARC services.  Anyway, in 2020 the issues were finally resolved and from what I have heard the CPL replacement project will wrap up sometime in June or July.

Back in 2018 I reported on the demise of the well known CPLs at KC JCT in Covington, KY and worked under the assumption that the adjacent CPLs at OB Cabin would also be replaced.  Well it turns out I was wrong as for reasons unknown, the CPLs at OB Cabin hung on for a further two years with a planned retirement in mid-May 2020.  Surprisingly, instead of masts or dwarfs or dwarf masts attached to the side of the bridge or the old gantry uprights, CSX has decided on some sort of super-signal bridge that has more in common with a tower crane than a railroad signal and might be the tallest railroad signal ever constructed



This will leave the single cantilever at WINTON PLACE and another adjacent Indiana and Ohio Railway interlocking as the only two remaining main line CPLs in the Cincinatti Area.  Of course that's a downright luxury as the ENTIRE STATE OF MARYLAND, home of the Baltimore and Ohio itself, will now be completely devoid of main line CPLs.  Think about that one :-(

PRR Legacy News

I have two bits of news here regarding the Port Road/Enola Branch and SEPTA's ARSENAL reconstruction project.  On the Port Road I had previously reported that new-new signals had been spotted at CP-COLA in anticipation of a Rule 562 conversion that had been hinted at for some time.  Updated information shows no evidence of either new signals or "C" boards at CP-COLA or CP-LAKE indicating that NS seems to be fine with leaving the 2012 vintage signals in place with 562 in operation to the north and south.  I also came into possession of some interior photos of COLA tower and the CTC console has indeed been removed, but many other vintage components remain untouched since the tower was closed in the 1980's and decommissioned as a relay room in around 2012.

In SEPTA land, SEPTA will be undertaking an additional rebuild of the ARSENAL interlocking area between May 10th and 31st.  As previously reported ARSENAL's limits will be extended down the R3 West Chester line to include an additional crossover and a new turnback track and crossover will be installed between the current north limited of ARSENAL and University City station.  Finally, WALNUT interlocking is to be eliminated in some fashion. 

It is unclear what the new arrangement will entail signal wise.  ARSENAL and the WALNUT locations could use some or all of its PL's.  The elimination of WALNUT is also somewhat short sighted as it will drastically lengthen the distance between a full crossover and the 30th St station platform with the crossover capacity now being south of the University City.  Under single track operation wrong railing trains will now have to make a station stop at University City before they can clear the bottleneck whereas before they could wait at University City while waiting to cross over.