Messages

1

General Discussion / Goose Island operation

« on: July 20, 2018, 01:11:20 PM »

It is now official, The Chicago Terminal rr is abandoning the Goose Island operation.
They have filed with the STB to abandon the last piece of the operation.
Here is the link: https://www.stb.gov/filings/all.nsf/ba7f93537688b8e5852573210004b318/29c1ed0e60bbac6d852582d00043d7d8/$FILE/246106.pdf

2

General Discussion / Google Streetview

« on: July 10, 2018, 10:49:02 PM »

Google streetview has mapped the Chicago River from Goose Island to South Branch near the stock yards.  With streetview, you can see Goos Island from the river.

3

General Discussion / Re: UP Gives Chicago Terminal the Boot in Elk Grove Village-New Operator

« on: July 07, 2018, 11:39:29 PM »

NS does not have claim to heritage lines of the Conrail. When the government formed Conrail, the corporate name of Chicago Junction disappeared.  The tracks are still around and the property titles still say Chicago Junction. The operating company went away. NYC and Penn were reincorporated when CSX and NS were cutting up Conrail.  Conrail was a quasi government line until the railroad became profitable and paid back the government loans. Then Conrail issued stocks and bonds as a regular corporation. The former railroad names that make up NYC and Penn RR are not owned by NS or CSX. Conrail is still an active railroad (called Conrail shared assets).
A check of the State files show that the Chicago Junctions was incorporated on 4/13/2018.

4

General Discussion / Re: UP Gives Chicago Terminal the Boot in Elk Grove Village-New Operator

« on: July 06, 2018, 11:03:25 PM »

Chicago Junction and Chicago river & Indiana (former subsidaries of New York Central , then PennCentral), were dissolved and merged into Conrail. As per Government overview. Picture of locomotive : http://casr.dhke.com/casr245.htm

5

General Discussion / Re: Last Chicago Terminal Train in Chicago

« on: February 17, 2018, 11:23:23 PM »

Chicago Terminal and City of Chicago are in negotiation to turn what is left of the rail to a trail. Here is the link: https://www.stb.gov/filings/all.nsf/ba7f93537688b8e5852573210004b318/2b35e86915113ca1852582350063f922?OpenDocument

6

General Discussion / How the City of Chicago views the area around the rail line

« on: October 23, 2017, 11:23:48 AM »

Posted at STB: https://www.stb.gov/filings/all.nsf/ba7f93537688b8e5852573210004b318/0a456ecbe8d32b41852581bf0071da9a/$FILE/244573.pdf

7

General Discussion / Chicago Terminal and Goos Island and abandonment

« on: October 12, 2017, 11:47:51 PM »

Here is the link to the adverse abandonment filed by Alloy. Interesting read, contains information about the cost of leasing the locomotives, the customers on line (or lack of) and pictures. Caution: this is a large PDF.
Link: https://www.stb.gov/filings/all.nsf/ba7f93537688b8e5852573210004b318/dff1463f05044182852581b70047b0a5/$FILE/244514.pdf

8

General Discussion / The Chicago Terminal shrinking

« on: June 04, 2017, 12:12:42 PM »

Post at the STB, a company handling the former Finkl property has files to force the CTM to abandon all trackage east to the Chicago River (Cortland ave). The property company claims the CTM interferes with its development plans. Also, the Big Bay Lumber site is being redeveloped as an office complex.
Here is the filing: https://www.stb.gov/filings/all.nsf/ba7f93537688b8e5852573210004b318/116243e729ea78a685258133005ec6b3/$FILE/243627.pdf

9

General Discussion / Re: Forest Park Branch Track Diagram?

« on: May 17, 2017, 10:13:08 PM »

Melrose park towards Mannheim Rd is switched by IHB/Chessie Logistics Here is a link for more info: http://casr.dhke.com/casr213.htm
Note, since Chessie Logistics took over, there have been no freight cars on the line in the pass 2 years

10

General Discussion / Re: 1960s photo location?

« on: October 19, 2016, 03:42:43 PM »

Western Ave and Logan Blvd Looking North

11

General Discussion / 10/12/16 report

« on: October 13, 2016, 10:49:11 AM »

I was in the area on business, took a quick look att he Goose Island area, here is the report:
1. There is a fence across the track the leads to Goose Island, the fence in on the North side of North ave. This is a solid iron fence, not a gate.
2. Morton Salt is closed,weeds growing in and around the tracks
3. The Chicago terminal Loco in back at North ave yard, however, the loco is not parked by the office, instead is it parked on the eastern most yard track, near the MOW vehicles.

12

General Discussion / Goose Island report

« on: August 17, 2016, 05:30:47 PM »

Was down in that area today, here is the report.
1. Chicago Terminal Locomotive is gone from the North ave yard
2. Bridge over river still in open position.
3. tracks on goose island, and in Kingsbury show no sighs of use
4. All Finkl steel facilities are gone, just a large empty lot.
5. The small scrapper at Cortland and the river: gone
6. Elston Ave reroute is now open

13

General Discussion / Carrol St and Racine

« on: October 18, 2015, 11:45:23 AM »

Carrol street at Racine is being repaved. The rails that were in the street are now exposed.
Spotted this Friday night while passing by.

14

General Discussion / Dunning line is done

« on: September 29, 2015, 04:28:25 PM »

Soo line (CP rail) ex CMSP&P has filed to abandon the what is left of the dunning line'
Here is the filing:
 http://www.stb.dot.gov/filings/all.nsf/ba7f93537688b8e5852573210004b318/243e0070dda9c14985257ecf0064d899/$FILE/239270.pdf

15

General Discussion / Chicago Terminal operations

« on: September 28, 2015, 11:38:45 PM »

This was posted to the Illinois railroad yahoo group:

There are three jobs at the Chicago Terminal RR:
5AM- Clean up crew, anything extra that needs done, switch North Avenue downtown if need be
9AM- Regular Elk Grove Industry work
5PM- Regular Bensenville Industry work

All of the jobs work off of channel 97-97 when on CTM trackage. There are 9 customers on the East side of the park, there are 5 customers on the North (west) side of the park, and there are 5 customers on the southwest side of the park.

The East side (701 Lead/LOEB) requires a shoving movement to all of the industries to service, the North side (711 Lead), the engine leads (depending on amount of industries needing to be served) up to Richelieu Foods, where a gravity drop is performed, and the engine pulls the train back down towards the yard, spotting and pulling cars wherever needed. The west side (709 Lead), the engine leads, pulls/spots where needed on the trip west, and once on the bottom lead (706 Lead) a gravity drop is performed, and the engine pulls back east serving customers along the way.

A typical day for the day job (9AM) is usually about 5-7 hours, so if you are looking to shoot the job, it's a somewhat narrow window as far as railroading goes.

The yard is private property all around, the only way to view it, is from a business parking lot to the south side, even though you'd be trespassing on their property now. The Bi-levels are still on property, they have just been moved out of the yard. The open hoppers that you saw along Lively, are storage cars. There are a lot of those, and various other types of freight cars in storage on the various leads that have no online customers.

Photography wise, the parks have some nice open spots for photos, as well as their confined spaces if you like that for industrial railroading. The EGV park is fairly easy to get around, you have Nicholas Boulevard that splits the North side in half, with streets running E/W between all of the leads. Lively Boulevard cuts the North and West sides in half, with streets running E/W throughout both sides as well.

I hope this helps,

Mike Polk
Conductor
Chicago Terminal Railroad