CSX's habit of spinning off less profitable subdivisions to short line operators has created another signaling museum, this time in the state of Florida. Similar as to how the Lake State railroad has preserved about 130 miles of C&O era signaling and 1950's vintage code line CTC, the Florida Gulf & Atlantic Railroad has preserved about 250 miles of Seaboard signaling on the former CSX Tallahassee Sub between Baldwin, FL and Tallahassee, FL, where the line becomes DCS controlled. The lease took effect in 2019 and after three years of operation there is so far no indication that the new tenant has any plans to upgrade the signaling. Not only would it not benefit them financially, but as a Class III operator they are exempt from the PTC requirement.
The Tallahassee sub signaling museum is important because of CSX's effectiveness in eradicating the seaboard signaling on its S and A lines running between Richmond and Miami/Tampa as well as secondary routes such as the Abbeville Sub. Despite using Seaboard Style (duh) Color Lights and in some cases 1980's vintage US&S elephant ear signals, CSX was relentless in its modernization efforts. In the above street view at SE LIVE OAK we can see a US&S TR type target signal with a large type backing that was preferred by the seaboard. The signal is in a poor man's siding exit bracket with a dwarf adjacent to the mast with a doll arm. All in all the subdivision hosts 29 controlled sidings with 32 interlockings and a large number of intermediate signals between them. Definitely worth checking out if one happens to be on the I-10 corridor in northern Florida.
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ReplyDeleteLocal to FGAR and have chased it many times: the signal system is in sad shape. They would like to have it removed, not sure if they have filed for it or not. Originally RailComm was doing the dispatching, but they had issues connecting to the equipment and many times the line would be treated as in a signal outage. FGAR now pays CSX to dispatch, I believe handled by JB desk. The ops plan is set up so there is only one train for each stretch of track, and they all hand cars off to each other. No need for signals other than for speed (I've clocked them at 50mph, Lee DD once gave a readout of 60mph, but its axle counts are defective so take that with a grain of salt).
ReplyDelete*edited for grammar*