Re: Fw: loaded hopper interchanges
|
ELDEN GATWOOD <ELDEN.GATWOOD@...>
Chuck;
toggle quoted message
Show quoted text
I have heard repeatedly over the years that the coal mined in the Monongahela River valley and adjacent areas of SW PA, which was served by the PRR, P&LE, B&O, and Monongahela Rwy, was considered particularly desirable for steam locomotive use. Some roads contracted with the PRR expressly for this purpose. I also remember occasionally seeing open hoppers from roads like the Santa Fe, Monon, and others, which tended to catch the eye in a string of otherwise "usual" roads (in my area, at least). How they got there is beyond me. There was also a clear correlation between certain roads and the commodity they carried that showed up in my area. Twin hoppers from the B&O and RDG often carried stone (limestone or dolomite), while the endless numbers of PRR and P&LE open hoppers were usually coal, or in the case of the PRR, sometimes red ore in pellets. Montour hoppers were always coal off of their line, but could be backloaded to MTR territory in some cases. Covered hoppers came from all over, as these often carried additives in powdered form, of a variety that I can only remember portions of. Gondolas were much more of a mixed bag in the Pgh area. Many older PRR guys told me that the PRR was in a state of constant gon shortage, and would grab gons from wherever they could to meet the constant needs of the mills. I saw gons from just about every road in North America, it seemed, including several Canadian roads. The Santa Fe and Burlington were much more frequently represented than their numbers would seem to indicate, but there were also gons from totally obscure roads like the McKeesport Connecting, P&BR, C&BL, Lake Terminal, and others. The gons (like hoppers with holes stuffed with rags) were often overlooked for "bad ordering", despite pushed out ends, missing flooring, and busted out boards and side panels, due to this overwhelming need. I am in the middle of a campaign to represent some of these cars on my layout, and is it ever fun! Elden Gatwood -----Original Message-----
From: raildata@... [mailto:raildata@...] Sent: Friday, January 16, 2004 8:51 AM To: STMFC@... Subject: Re: [STMFC] Fw: loaded hopper interchanges I keep trying to kill the "urban myth" that hopper cars never strayed far from their home roads. I would not be so rash as to theorize what happened in the Misdwest and far West but up to and through WW2 "foreign" hoppers were very common on lines in the Northeast. As a kid I contantly watched of trains on the D&H and DL&W near my home in Scranton PA. I saw lots of loaded on N&W, B&O, and PRR hoppers going north on the D&H, which for all purposes was an extension of the PRR to Canada and New England. Despite being in the heart of the anthracite mining area, I would estimate that 40% of the coal on the D&H was bituminous in non-D&H hoppers. It has to be pointed out that all the "anthracite" roads really burned bitumionus or a mix of it and anthracite from the 1920s on. The supply of anthracite "culm" simply ran out and the good anthracite was too expensive. The large DL&W engine facility got all it locomtive coal in PRR cars. I think some roads, including the LV, sent thier own hoppers to the soft coal mines to hahul loco coal. There is evidence that the quad and triple hoppers owned by these orads were used in this service because the anthracite retail coal sales always preferred the smaller twin hoppers. The return to buying twin hoppers in the last years of the anthracite industry on both LV and DL&W bears out the yielding to demands of the cutomers I even recall seeing quite a few of the Southern composite hoppers with the external chains holding the hopper doors on D&H. I'm not enough of a Southern expert to know the class, etc. but the were genrally similar to the D&H Seeley cars. Statistics on the tonnage of anthracite and bituminous for various lines are easily gotten from Moody's, etc and they are tangible evidence for off line loadings in most cases. I find it hard to go along with much of the hypotheses and assumed logic about car distribution that are posted as factual on this board and every so often have to sound off with some observations based on fact. Chuck Yungkurth Boulder CO _____ Yahoo! Groups Links * To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/STMFC/ <http://groups.yahoo.com/group/STMFC/> * To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: STMFC-unsubscribe@... <mailto:STMFC-unsubscribe@...?subject=Unsubscribe> * Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to the Yahoo! Terms of <http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/> Service. |
|
|