Remembering South Jersey's Insulator Ranch

For years, if one were driving near Atlantic City, New Jersey, perhaps taking a shortcut between the Atlantic City Expressway exit 12 and the Garden State Parkway exit 41 due to summertime congestion, one might pass something on the side of the road that might cause a momentary feeling of disbelief where one might question what they just saw.  Located at the edge of the famous New Jersey Pine Barrens in Galloway Township, the slightly less famous Insulator Ranch was chronicled in all the typical quirky attraction websites like Weird NJ and Roadside America as it sat there provoking thousands of double takes over the years. Insulator Ranch was exactly that, a ranch house with a circumferential fence-line  constructed entirely of railroad pole-line poles fully stocked with green glass insulators. 

I first stumbled upon the site in the summer of 1998 and likely passed it once or twice in the years that followed.  In the age of Google Maps I would check in periodically, confirming that it was both still there and that my mind had not been playing tricks on me in ages past. Then, just recently, a check of the updated Street View showed that while the home and property were still there, all the magic of the green glass insulators had gone. According to the reports, the creator of the insulator art piece, a one Stanley E. Hammell, had passed away at age 89 in 2012 and was followed by his wife in 2018. I am sure one could probably dig deep enough to find out what the family did with the over 10,000 green glass insulators, but surprisingly, their fate has eluded the reach of Google. 

Mr. Hammell said that he began his collection in 1985 and continued through to the early 1990's. He talks about train shows and walking various rail lines, all things I am sure he did, but none of the articles provide insight into where I am confident he obtained the bulk of his collection because its the same place that my family came away with bushel baskets of our own. The former Camden and Atlantic, aka PRSL Main Line from Lindenwold to Atlantic City.

Having once hosted the fastest scheduled trains in the world, by the 1970's the PRSL Main Line to Atlantic City was a shadow of its former self, seeing a paltry peak direction service of ~3 daily round trips. By the late 1960's, the a double tracked, cab signaled main line constructed to PRR standards had been reduced to a single track with manual block operation south of Winslow Jct. In 1983 NJ DoT threw in the towel when Conrail stopped providing commuter rail contract services and all remaining signal infrastructure on the line was switched off and abandoned in place. This created a bit of a collector's gold rush with my then future shop teacher making away with an entire PRR position light mast signal and a single fallen pole providing my own family with decades' worth of giftable insulator paperweights. 

In 1985 Mr. Hammell would find this semi-abandoned rail line with 40 odd miles of green glass insulated pole line just a few miles from his front door. I am not sure what his early collecting methods would have involved, but about 5 years later the route would see a complete reconstruction with modern signaling that had no need for lineside poles. As you can see in the photo above not a single pole line pole remains. This means they were cut down in mass by a scrapper looking to recover the copper telegraph wire. This is a fairly common practice and I am convinced that a certain retiree happened to find himself at the right place at the right time to capture large numbers of the otherwise "worthless"  insulators that he would go on to assemble into a monumental yet underappreciated work of roadside art. 

Insulator Ranch was one of those local institutions that seemed destined to last forever until suddenly it was gone. I never got any of my own high quality photos of the installation or spoke to Mr. Hammell or even had whichever car I was in slow down or stop. I am assuming that the collection found some sort of home as a lot of 10k+ green glass insulators would be certainly worth money, but it still goes to show that institutions are run by people and people get old and die. The next time you see some unique railfan house, don't be so sure that another member of the community will step up to purchase it when the time comes.

Railroad Signals and the Materials of Yesteryear

NOTE:  This article first appeared in the Summer 2017 issue of The Trackside Photographer.

In 1967 young people were told that plastics were the future and the future did not disappoint.  Today the world is made out of plastic, carbon fibre, corrosion resistant lightweight alloys, high strength concrete and LEDs.  This technology has generally converted our world from one where stuff is expensive and people are cheap, to exactly the opposite.  I could go on and on about the many economic ramifications of this, but in essence "things" went from being crafted and artisan, to being so invisible that they might as well not matter.  Back in the day the Pennsylvania Railroad was the largest private employer in North America with over 300,000 employees, roughly the same as WalMart.  This vast army of workers was needed to polish, paint, lubricate and generally maintain all of the expensive, labor intensive technology that allowed humans to move at speeds faster than brisk walk.  Replacing the materials of old was part and parcel to being able to replace the workers that cared for them, however as we charge into the middle of the 21st century some of these materials have soldiered on in the service of railroad signaling and, until their inevitable replacement, they provide a window into the pre-digital industrial age.

CSX Washington Sub - South Orange Interlocking

Steel and iron are the stereotypical railroad materials as demand for bridges, rails and locomotives practically created the modern steel industry.  Of course steel wasn't just used for girders and boilers. Back in the day this was the only metal one had available for structural components of any size and before the advent of plastic or other composites, metal was one of the only materials available with an adequate strength to weight ratio.  Stronger, weather proof and more durable than wood, iron and steel became the materials of choice ofr railroad signals and signal structures.  This US&S style N color light signal mast shown above is almost completely made of iron and steel, right down to the base.  Cast iron housing and brackets, sheet steel backing, steel pipe mast, strap iron ladder work, heck, even the signal wires are sheathed in iron.

CSX Philly Sub - MP 80 Auto Signal "Whitemarsh"

Cheap and easy to stamp, cut, forge or cast, steel was everywhere, but it's suffers from a major weakness against air and water.  The scourge of rust requires care and paint, and paint requires workers to apply and remove.  In the 21st century aluminum is cheap and plentiful.  Lightweight and rust free, any signal made of aluminum will look as good on the day it is installed as the day it is removed perhaps decades in the future without needing so much as a man hour of skilled labour.

CSX Cumberland Sub - Paterson Creek interlocking

Also used for bridges and track structure, wood was the plastic of its day.  Light and easy to shape, it also has tensile strength allowing it to span distances in a way that stone or concrete cannot.  Although it was excluded from most signal structures, wood was employed in pole lines to support the signaling and telegraph wires that carried little bits of voltage from one signal location to the next.  Unlike steel, stuff can be easily attached to wood with nails or screws and, somewhat surprisingly, wooden poles can also last decades after being impregnated with petrochemical tars.  However modern technology found other ways to eliminate the wooden pole lines by replacing the wires they carried with fiber optics or wireless signals.

D&H 'QS" Interlocking, Mechanicville, NY

Surprisingly, cotton was an important material in railroad signaling.  Before the advent of PVC sheath insulation, large signal cables were wrapped in cotton impregnated with tar to keep out the elements.  Cotton insulated cables went hand in hand with the pole line concept as attempting to bury such a cable would quickly lead to its failure.  Damage vulnerable to wind, snow, rain and trees, this was accepted a cost of doing business.

PRR 138kv Transmission Line near Martic Forge, PA

From the smallest telegraph wire to the thickest high voltage transmission cable, copper carried the electrons that powered the signals and sent the data.  Synonymous with the term "electrical conductor" to this day, copper was generally replaced by aluminum braids in power applications and of course its role in data transmission was tied to the pole line . Ultimately railroads did all they could to get out of the power transmission business, in some cases going as far to replace copper cable with solid state solar panels.

CP-MIDWAY - Port Road Branch

Large ceramic insulators met the same fate as the copper wire when the business of providing signal power was turned over to the local utilities.  Outsourcing is the name of the game in the 21st century.  It made no sense for railroads to act as power companies, employing linemen and stocking electrical hardware such as this.

CP-SLOPE, Altoona, PA.

PCB's are probably the best class of material for insulating transformers being non-flammable and possessing a high dielectric coefficient.  Unfortunately they also cause cancer and persist in the environment almost indefinitely.  All the more motivation for railroads to stop running their own power grids.

CSX Cumberland Sub - Magnolia, WV

 Glass was the insulator of choice for low voltage signal and telegraph wires running along side the power supply lines on the poles.  Edging out ceramic in the same use case, the sparking glass insulators made railroad poles a look a bit like Christmas trees.  Replaced at first by cheap rubber and plastic models and ultimately by wireless, glass insulators became a staple of country antique shoppes and the preferred target of rural target shooters.

More expensive than its pole line cousin, optical glass collected the light from the low wattage signal bulbs and and protected it 1-2 miles down the track for approaching trains to see.  Most color light signal lenses consisted of an inner colored glass filter assembly with an outer Fresnel lens that focused the beam.  Today these have been replaced by high intensity LED's that often do not need a focusing lens, making do with a cheap clear plastic cover.

CP-RADE, Radebaugh, PA

Compressed air was the power source of choice for many early power interlocking installations.  Not only were air operated switch machines simple and cheap, it was also easy to safety control the flow of air using low voltage electrical circuits passing through an electro-machanical interlocking machine.  Of course air was only cheap as long as the workers needed to keep the lines dry and leak free were also cheap.  Today pneumatic switch machines are fading fast in the presence of bullet proof, high voltage electric machines.

CP-TRAFF, Trafford, PA

Silver paint is typically applied to relay huts and cabinets to reflect the sun and keep internal temperatures low.  In this case the need for painting has been replaced by corrosion free shiny materials and compact air conditioners.

CP-HAWSTONE, Lewistown, PA

Lead acid batteries were once provided in large quantities for when the railroad supplied power suffered some sort of outage, as was frequently the case in the pole line era.  Because the batteries would vent hydrogen gas as they charged and discharged, they were stored in concrete "wells", outside the relay huts where there was no risk of explosion.  Today improvements in battery technology and power reliability have made such large bulky backup power arrangements unnecessary.

PRR OVERBROOK tower.

Relays are constructs of copper coils moving silver plated electrical contacts to make and break electrical circuits, all sealed up in a glass envelope.  Once the standard unit of electronic logic until the advent of the transistor, the function of relays was duplicated by solid state gizmos such as transistors.  Relay logic was standardized across vendors and can't be hacked, but changes are costly and time consuming to implement, making software based alternatives far more attractive.

CSX Cumberland Sub MP 130 Auto Signal "Drywall"

Up through the middle of the 20th century railroads were once at the vanguard of technical innovation, leading the way in telecommunications, computing and material science.  While today these technologies and materials of yesteryear can make railroads seem like an under-funded anachronism, a different view shows how well the engineering of the past has stood the test of time.  While the materials of today are in many ways superior, they lack much of the spirit of what came before.  A spirit created by human hands crafting, fitting and maintaining the materials of yesteryear from one century to the next.

PHOTOS: Port Road Trips - CRESS to HARBOR

It's no secret that the PRR was never a huge fan of CTC thanks to their abundance of multi-track main lines and manned interlocking towers.  So far we have seen an example of the PRR's use of CTC without traffic control, ie remote control interlockings, but a predominance of Rule 251 operation.  However due to its rather constrained geography that favored single track lines with passing sidings, the Susquehanna River valley also featured two genuine Rule 261 signaled CTC lines.  One of these is the Buffalo Line running north of Harrisburg and, of course, the other is the Port Road Branch running from PORT to PERRY.  So while the remaining segments of our Port Road Trip may seem a bit less interesting than those that came before, it actually represents an opportunity to examine a method of operation common to the rest of the rail system that the PRR tended to avoid.

So passing CRESS we finally leave the COLA CTC zone...or at least the Harrisburg Division CTC zone.  Below CRESS the Port Road entered the Maryland Division and if you recall the COLA interlocking sheet there are 50 levers on the 150 lever CTC machine used by the Maryland Division. These 50 levers control the 9 interlockings south of CRESS and north of QUARRY.  Today we will be looking at the intermediate signal south of CRESS, the HARBOR siding and a little bit of the Safe Harbor substation complex.

Between CP-CRESS and CP-WEST HARBOR are the MP 35 automatic signals C357 and C356.  Remember the mileage is now counting down towards Perryville instead of Parkesburg.   Here we see the two signals looking westward with the Fisherman's Run flume (aka shoefly) far in the background.  At this point the A&S is running parallel to the Port Road about 20 or 30 feet up the rocky slope.  The signals are arranged in the typical fashion for a single pole catenary structure with one PL being mounted on the catenary mast and the other on its own mast.

The C357 signal is displaying an Approach indication for the  stop signal at CP-CRESS.  Although CRESS features a medium speed turnout, because it is the entrance to double track ABS territory there is only a straight and a restricted speed route available and therefore C357 does not need to display Approach Medium.

Here in this rather backlit reverse view  we see the C356 mast signal.  The layout of this intermediate is a bit counter intuitive because the signal that is unable to display Approach Medium is the distant for an interlocking with only restricted speed routes while the signal that can't display Approach Medium faces an interlocking that could have a Medium speed route if not for the Rule 251. Note the lack of pole line power tap.  Here the 6000 volt, 100hz power supply was running up on the A&S alignment and feeding both it and the Port Road.

The reason for the lower head | on C356 is not because the Harbor siding was ever downgraded in the Conrail era, but instead because of the short (5000 foot) distance between  CP-HARBOR and CP-WEST HARBOR.  Trains diverging at CP-WEST HARBOR would get an Approach.  Trains stopping at CP-HARBOR (perhaps for a meet) would get an Approach Medium.

This rather long shot of C357 shows the signal displaying Approach in the time before the dispatcher lined a route at CP-CRESS for an eastbound NS freight train.  Around 2010 all the catenary poles were chopped down by NS.

After the re-signaling project a new bi-directional mast was installed with Darth Vader signals.  The odd layout has been replaced by Approach Medium signals in both directions.  Not sure I agree with the placement of the signal and the relay box on the lake side of the tracks.  This part of the river is a well known flood risk.

CP-WEST HARBOR, at MP 33.2, is the west end of a 5000 foot long restricted speed ending.  It was located in the shadow of the impressive Safe Harbor viaduct and adjacent to the Safe Harbor Dam.  The single \ on the lower head is all you get in this situation.  If the siding were signaled this signal would also come with a lower head \ for Slow Approach.

PHOTOS: Port Road Trips - WAGO To SHOCKS

This installment of Port Road Trips is going to be a short one between it includes only the two intermediate signal locations between WAGO interlocking, discussed in the last installment, and SHOCKS interlocking located at the junction of the Enola Branch and Royalton Branch.  Unlike the automatic signals between WAGO and STELL which had been almost entirely replaced with NS type Darth Vader masts, the section between WAGO and SHOCKS exists as an island of PRR signaling with both locations getting a bit of a refresh when everything else was getting the color light treatment.

I will be showing off the signals with two sets of photos.  The first are part of the larger Port Road tour collected in 2004 by a friend of the blog and shows what things looked like before the catenary poles were removed.  The second group of photos were taken just recently in 2013.  Unlike the signals north of WAGO these were not recently renumbered by NS as they were never seen as part of the Northern Central milepost system and reflect the distance to Parkesburg, PA.

The first of the two locations is the Milepost 45 automatics.  Here in this 2004 view you can see the typical layout PRR PL automatics where there is a single catenary mast.  One signal is mast mounted to the cat pole in the typical electric territory style.  The other signal is mounted on a standard PRR ABS mast.  Back in 2004 this section of the line still played host to an out of service 138kV 25Hz power circuit and an active 6000V 100Hz signal power circuit.  Note the old school mast base/relay case next to the larger PRR relay box with the attached block phone. 

The 495W ABS signal typically displays Approach for the Stop signal at WAGO, but back in 2004 it seemed that a train was en route as WAGO was pulled up enabling the 495W to display Clear.  There is no lower head since WAGO does not provide for any non-Restricted speed diverging routes. 

 Somewhat backlit view of the 496E automatic displaying Clear with the catenary poles stretching off into the distance.

Getting to the MP 49 automatic did not require any sort of off road hiking as not only are they located adjacent to a small park road running along the Susquehanna River, but the Conrail C&S forces  took the time to build this handy dandy little stairway up to them.  Note the 6000V signal power supply.  Each place the signal power was tapped the PRR provided a isolation switch in case there was some sort of line fault.  Far above the PRR's 25Hz power supply is a modern day 3-phase 60Hz high voltage transmission line.

PHOTOS: Port Road Trips - STELL

 This will be the first of a series of posts on the former PRR Port Road and Enola Branch.  Through my own efforts and the efforts of a friendly Amtrak employee I have compiled a full record of the line before the recent resignaling efforts by NS.

In April 2009  I got a chance to document a rather interesting interlocking on the currently Norfolk Southern Enola Branch. The line was originally part of the Pennsylvania Railroad before being controlled by both the Penn Central and Conrail. What today is called STELL interlocking is located directly south of the once famous Enola Yard which was up through the 1950's, the world's largest railroad yard with 145 miles of track and two classification humps.

Through the PRR eta Enola was the hub of their freight operations in eastern Pennsylvania. The yard sat at the junction of the east-west Main Line from Philadelphia to Pittsburgh as well as the Northern Central route from Baltimore to Buffalo. Also important were the low-grade freight which, as the name implied, provided a low grade alternative to the main line between Harrisburg and Philadelphia as well as the Port Road branch, which ran down the Susquehanna River to the main line between Philadelphia and Washington DC. The Port Road was the preferred freight route to the south as it had lower grades than the curvy Northern Central.

In the late 1930's the low-grade lines and Port Road were electrified and for 50 years saw an endless parade of powerful Motors hauling the PRR's freight toward Pittsburgh with a stop in Enola to change the power and re-crew. Through the 70's and 80's the PRR became the PC which was nationalized into Conrail after the PC's record bankruptcy. Amtrak gained control of the Northeast Corridor and that line, once integral to the PRR's east coast freight service, because increasingly off limits to freight, with traffic moved to parallel, and non-electrified lines. Eventually, the Port Road and Enola Branch became host to those few trains destined to the ports of Wilmington, Baltimore and the Delmarva peninsula, operating at night over Amtrak's corridor to avoid interfering with high speed passenger trains.

The reason I have launched into all this backstory is because it is important to understand how the signaling has evolved. When the line was electrified in the late 1930's the signaling was thoroughly rebuilt with cab signals and power supplied from the electrification. The Port Road and parts of the Enola branch made extensive use of CTC. In the 70's and 80's traffic on this route was declining, but the route wasn't burned with lots of interlocking towers. Moreover while traffic was declining, Amtrak's white periods forced a lot of trains into a small window of time, so there was no way to downgrade the route or signaling. The result was that the Enola Branch and Port Road were frozen in time, even keeping their all amber PRR position lights instead of getting the red upper head - - lenses installed by the Penn Central and Conrail.

For a quick reference one can find the 1998 Conrail employee timetable of the line here and the part with STELL interlocking here. Unlike most Conrail interlockings STELL was not prefixed with a "CP-" which puts the interlocking in the category of a train order block limit. I don't know why this was done, but its something I have seen on some single direction ABS lines elsewhere.

Going back to the days of the PRR, STELL interlocking didn't even exist. It was part of a larger interlocking called DAY.

Built in 1930 DAY controlled the south end of Enola Yard with a mechanical lever frame. Where STELL currently sits was where the Enola Branch split in two with two trains proceeding directly along the river and two tracks splitting off to rise up to LEMO tower and its junction with the bridge over the Susquehanna River and Shippensburg Branch. This split was technically part of DAY interlocking, but was controlled by a small 5-unit "table interlocker", which was a US&S product that used single lever modules that could be hooked together and placed on a table top to control simple junctions.

As the line proceeded south (railroad east) from LEMO it followed the British practice of having the pair of freight tracks next to the pair of passenger tracks. This was because the two passenger tracks would eventually curve inland at Wago Jct, which was slightly past CLY interlocking, to travel the Northern Central route through York to Baltimore.

In 1942 DAY was drastically rebuilt. The old mechanical section was kept, but 2 more running tracks were installed south of the old interlocking. These tracks and the junction between the LEMO connection were then wired into a brand new US&S Model 14 power frame sitting next to the mechanical frame. The table interlocker was recycled to control a few switches in Enola yard. If you look at the DAY interlocking diagram you can see which parts of the interlocking are controlled by which machine. Now, sometime in the 70's DAY was reconfigured again with the two track flat split junction being reconfigured into a basic crossover with a single track connection to the Shippensburg Branch. This reconfigured segment of DAY is actually what would become STELL and, somewhat ironically, would outlast the main part of DAY, which was completely removed once freight shifted away from Enola yard after the end of Conrail electrified operations in 1981.

I managed to dig up some photos of DAY tower before it was closed and demolished. First we see the tower wedged in between the 4 tracks coming out of Enola yard. As built the tower only had two tracks running in front of it and the road overpass had yet to be built to squeeze them in. The mechanically worked points have also been converted to pneumatic operation. The overhead wires have also been removed.

Here we look inside the tower. The inside has been painted a Penn Central green. In the foreground we have US&S Model 14 power frame, then the mechanical frame in the center of the tower and finally the table interlocker. The model board is common to all three interlocking machines.

Looking the other direction with the mechanical frame in the foreground. The PRR used a slightly different lever color scheme. Most signal levers were yellow and check levers were red (with black and blue being the standard color for switches and facing point locks).

So after DAY tower closed, the crossover and junction with the Shippenburg Branch were spun off into the new STELL interlocking. DAY on the other hand became a block limit station on the westbound track and a single controlled signals on the eastbound track, there to admit trains into the single block section between the yard and STELL. Here are pictures of that which replaced DAY.

In 2004 Norfolk Southern finally removed the DAY signal and the ABS between there and STELL in order to allow yard moved to back past the signal without needing dispatcher intervention.

Ok, finally we get to STELL interlocking. I have labeled my photos with my best guess of the lever number they received after the 1970's rebuild, so don't take them as gospel, not like it matters. Here we see the eastbound signals on a gantry using the old electrification supports. Note the "Begin Block" signs. The gantry replaced mast signals in the 70's rebuild.

Closeups of the individual signals. Because the line is single direction Rule 251 the signal on 2 track has no full speed routes and the track 1 signal has no signaled diverging routes. Looking back towards DAY with the high card detector and End Block signs.

PHOTOS: Magnolia Cutoff Pole Line CPLs

A summer before the major re-signaling project I took a road trip out along the B&O Main Line to see someone about a horse. On the way I made a series of stops to document some of the more remarkable (and accessible) signaling locations west of where HANCOCK Tower used to be in West Virginia (the Wales of the United States, only with more open mines). Two of these locations were on the famous B&O Magnolia Cutoff, which was constructed in 1914 to bypass the old alignment that followed several bends in the Potomac River as it weaved its way through a series of mountain ridges. The Cutoff consists of a series of 4 tunnels, two high bridges and a number of rocks cuts. Sometimes around 1957 the portion of the Main Line between Mexico and Hancock was outfitted with bi-directional signaling over three main tracks and CTC. The three track portions retained wide signal gantries that were held over from the earlier days of 4 single direction tracks, but the Magnolia Cutoff was only two track wide so it was equipped with a bevy of CPL bracket masts that has become one of its signature trademarks. (The third track followed the old route before being completely abandoned).

Anyway,  I was able to visit the automatic CPL signal locations at Paw Paw and the eponymous Magnolia and this turned out to be an inspired move on my part as fast forward 9 months and CSX is preparing a re-signaling effort in the area that will see the elimination of many if not all of the CPLs on the cutoff. This is a real shame as the two bracket masts at Magnolia are one of the most iconic railfan locations on the B&O main line, often being compared to the PRR's horseshoe curve (which ironically lost its classic signals in 2010) and a photo of them adorns the top of the Wikipedia page on North American railroad signaling. What makes the Magnolia signals special isn't so much anything about the signals themselves, but their surroundings, specifically the bridge-tunnel-bridge combination where the B&O main crosses the Potomac river, punches through an imposing ridgeline via the Graham tunnel, then crosses the Potomac again.

Of course the Achilles Heel of the classic B&O signaling on this route can be seen in this photo where we can see a thick bundle of wired heading out of the relay cabinets, over to the line of wooden telephone poles and then way in the distance is the scar of cut trees where this same pole line travels up and over the mountain. Multiply this across all 4 tunnels plus the intervening track mileage and you can see how this can become a maintenance nightmare not only keeping the pole line in a state of good repair, but actually getting people out to the location to do the job in the first place. 

So anyway while I had numerous photos of the Magnolia signals taken from the rear of passing Amtrak trains, I had never actually ventured out to see them up close. On this trip I sought to change that and I will share my findings here, but I should mention that the actual signals at Magnolia are not very special consisting of a pair of opposing CPL brackets with a pair of 3 aspect automatic block signals on each. Therefore I will try to focus on the humble pole lines that power the signals on their daily routine.

Here we see the CPL brackets facing east. They are approach lit and therefore dark as no trains went by during my visit. While located at milepost 145 they are plated as milepost 6.3 due to the cuttoff getting its own numbering system separate from the signals on the original alignment. When the old main line was abandoned no need was found to replate the cutoff signals.

The signals are simple 3 aspect ABS types able to display Clear, Approach and Restricted Proceed. The 12 o'clock orbital is illuminated for all three aspects, but when originally installed the orbital would darken if the flow of traffic was set opposing to the signal thus enabling a 4th, absolute Stop aspect. However updated signals rules have overridden this extra level of safety and the numberplate overrides the dark orbital making the signal a Restricted proceed even when traffic is set against it. (The absolute signal of the last interlocking can be assumed to provide protections against two trains meeting head on). To say these signals would need a coat of pain would be an understatement and given the upcoming re-signaling it is doubtful they will ever receive it. 

The westbound signals show an equal amount of corrosion, but at some point they got some new wiring as evidenced by the somewhat fresher blue insulation snaking about. The junction boxes on the rear of the westbound CPLs are of the original large, fluted type.

 

The eastbound signals newer compact versions made by GRS and were possibly installed with the CTC project.



Below view of the westbound bracket showing the steel mesh the maintainer stands on to service the signal heads.

Both brackets were originally painted with a silver base and a black top to aid in providing contrast for the signal lamps and visibility for the signal post itself. Eastbound signals are numbered 62 and 64, westbound 61 and 63.

 Other reasons old style bracket masts such as these are tagged for replacement are the lack of "OHSA compliance" for the ladders and handholds used by the signal maintainers. Bracket masts must be tall enough to be visible over trains on intervening tracks so its a pretty long climb up a very narrow ladder.

Looking at the rear of the eastbound bracket we see the battery box for backup power, the relay cabinets and the bracket mast.