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Street Running in the USA or Canada


trisonic
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3 minutes ago, Mike_Walker said:

Here's one interurban complete with street running in the traditional way. The Chicago South Shore & South Bend in Michigan City IN.

Some of the street running is to be moved to a roadside verge.

10th/11th Streets IIRC.

Edited by melmerby
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This lot in Ohio/Indiana was pretty massive:

Ohio_Electric_Railway_map_(14575084010).

 

The line from Toledo to Lima can be seen on the Virtual Railfan camera at Deshler crossroads as a single track N-S CSX freight line

Edited by melmerby
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2 hours ago, melmerby said:

It's strange to think that the US once had extensive networks of electric interurban lines, which these days would be seen as quite modern and eco friendly, but hardly any of these original ones remains.

The Pacific Electric alone ran over about 1000 miles of track.

All killed off by the rise of the private auto and freeway building..

 

A bit like in the UK where we ripped out thousands of miles of tram, trolley bus and branch lines only to be busy putting them back in at great expense!

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6 hours ago, melmerby said:

The Pacific Electric alone ran over about 1000 miles of track.

All killed off by the rise of the private auto and freeway building..

 

As a native metro Angeleno, I totally agree with you. In the last three decades, the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority(LA Metro) had spent gobs of money on rail infrastructure(light rail/subway) and they are still building new train routes today!

 

Wendell 

Idaho, USA 

Edited by Wendell1976
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7 hours ago, melmerby said:

This lot in Ohio/Indiana was pretty massive:

The line from Toledo to Lima can be seen on the Virtual Railfan camera at Deshler crossroads as a single track N-S CSX freight line

 

The N-S running single line visible today at Deshler is the old Baltimore & Ohio RR Toledo Subdivision and has never been an interurban.

What is shown as the Ohio Electric on the map above, and as the Cincinnati and Lake Erie in my copy of the December 1935 "Official Guide", may have run a parallel course to that route, but it isn't the same one!

 

The still in use B&O signals are the giveaway...

12-1374.jpg.735e232f9c9b7693bd5551fc0c1d42be.jpg

 

EDIT: It appears that the Interurban ran to the west of the B&O line, but not actually that far away from it, from what I can make out on this 1918 map..

https://www.railsandtrails.com/Maps/OhioRRCommission/1918/1918RailroadMapNW-100.jpg

The positon of the trackbed may well be where the electricity transmission lines on wooden poles to the right of the train can be seen in my photo above

Edited by Johann Marsbar
added photo + more info
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7 hours ago, melmerby said:

It's strange to think that the US once had extensive networks of electric interurban lines, which these days would be seen as quite modern and eco friendly, but hardly any of these original ones remains.

The Pacific Electric alone ran over about 1000 miles of track.

All killed off by the rise of the private auto and freeway building..


There is suspicion that there was a more deliberate cause of the closure of some Interurbans:

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Motors_streetcar_conspiracy

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42 minutes ago, Johann Marsbar said:

 

The N-S running single line visible today at Deshler is the old Baltimore & Ohio RR Toledo Subdivision and has never been an interurban.

What is shown as the Ohio Electric on the map above, and as the Cincinnati and Lake Erie in my copy of the December 1935 "Official Guide", may have run a parallel course to that route, but it isn't the same one!

 

The still in use B&O signals are the giveaway...

 

 

EDIT: It appears that the Interurban ran to the west of the B&O line, but not actually that far away from it, from what I can make out on this 1918 map..

https://www.railsandtrails.com/Maps/OhioRRCommission/1918/1918RailroadMapNW-100.jpg

The positon of the trackbed may well be where the electricity transmission lines on wooden poles to the right of the train can be seen in my photo above

I got the info I quoted from an American website where they said it was the current freight line through Deshler.

 

Is it possible they shared the track?

It happened elsewhere and an awful lot of them mirror the main routes very closely, except in some urban areas.

 

EDIT

I've been looking at the landscape north & south of Deshler and for a large part of the route there is either a road or scrubby track running parallel but about 10yds to the west so a second line looks very likely

e.g. this to the north:

https://goo.gl/maps/bhtKWfZp7ELsmAdw9

 

likewise, this to the south:

https://goo.gl/maps/X8ytwkSZd7GDoaQM6

Edited by melmerby
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3 minutes ago, melmerby said:

I got the info I quoted from an American website where they said it was the current freight line through Deshler.

 

Is it possible they shared the track?

It happened elsewhere and an awful lot of them mirror the main routes very closely, except in some urban areas.

 

Looking at Google Earth in the Deshler area you can make out the remains of a trackbed north of the town which runs alongside the B&O line on its western side, and south of the town there is a narrow country road (3C) that parallels the B&O that could have been where the C&LE, which shut in 1939, ran - possibly between the road and the B&O tracks.  There are electric supply lines following the road, which is sometimes a good indicator of former interurban lines. In Deshler, it looks as though the Interurban could have deviated west and run along Keyser Ave. You can just make out part of the deviation link through the northern side of the town as well. Unfortunately I have no books that cover the interurbans in this part of the USA at all, so can't look into it in more detail. The Ohio RR map shows no distance between the lines at all, and the interurban (a very thin green line on the map) is only really visible when it swings away up near Toledo.

As you say, running side by side was very common in the US.  The photo below, from near Mount Joy, PA, shows the former Conestoga Traction Interurban line trackbed, with the former PRR electrified Lancaster-Harrisburg line visible to the left!  Not even a fence between them, and again, electric supply poles still mark the former trolley route.12-3103.jpg.3c4080b756ccfec7862a4ea03095cc4a.jpg

 

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I've found some info after a bit of searching.

The road you point out paralleling the current CSX N-S line was the Interurban ROW.

You can also see on Google maps North of Deshler the where the vegetation veers from the main line to take course to the left of "Cast Metal" and down N Keyser Avenue through Deshler itself.

https://goo.gl/maps/zyxQ3geuJRgsu3fT8

 

On South Keyser Avenue the road has a distinctive central strip which could have been the tracks,

https://goo.gl/maps/tc1PFpFUK3tgKtceA

Apparently the roads originally just had a brick infill, where the tracks had been.

The "station" was just north of the grade crossing of the B&O E-W line.

 

 

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6 minutes ago, melmerby said:

Found this map, showing how the track went through Deshler:

txu-pclmaps-topo-oh-deshler-1906.jpg


 

Following this with interest - looking at the Google Maps, I’d suggest we can also see where the electric line curves back to its original route too - from S.Keyser Ave across the label for Bush Creek?

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16 minutes ago, melmerby said:

I've found some info after a bit of searching.

The road you point out paralleling the current CSX N-S line was the Interurban ROW.

You can also see on Google maps North of Deshler the where the vegetation veers from the main line to take course to the left of "Cast Metal" and down N Keyser Avenue through Deshler itself.

https://goo.gl/maps/zyxQ3geuJRgsu3fT8

 

On South Keyser Avenue the road has a distinctive central strip which could have been the tracks,

https://goo.gl/maps/tc1PFpFUK3tgKtceA

Apparently the roads originally just had a brick infill, where the tracks had been.

The "station" was just north of the grade crossing of the B&O E-W line.

 

 

 

Well, that seems to have solved the mystery of where the line went!  

I came across the "strip in the road" phenomenon somewhere in the back of beyond I stayed the first time I visited the USA in December 1981 - Independence in Kansas.  Never thought somewhere like that would have had trams, though there were even some metal traction poles being used for streetlighting.  It wasn't until many years later that I discovered the Union Electric Railway ran there up until 1948!

Interestingly, the map only appears to show a single line north of Deshler, whilst the interurban is clearly marked as a seperate line south of there, which seems odd.  If you look at Google maps and follow north to the crossing of County Road 1, there does appear to be the remains of a culvert that carried the Interurban, which suggests it was still completely seperate from the B&O - and going further north the trackbed does appear now and again, though fields seem to have been extended over it in some places.

If you go south to Leipsic, there are actually some parts of the Interurban route that are still in use with sidings on the trackbed once you reach the town.

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Bit more of the Ohio Electric Interurban here at Rouche de Boeuf,  the Maumee River crossing:

https://goo.gl/maps/P3YAmFbHFy4MXGN77

 

https://goo.gl/maps/oazqU3JmC9RJjGTv6

 

It's collapsing as in the last 10 years the 4th arch has slowly crumbled!

 

 

Edited by melmerby
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On 23/09/2020 at 20:09, melmerby said:

On South Keyser Avenue the road has a distinctive central strip which could have been the tracks,

https://goo.gl/maps/tc1PFpFUK3tgKtceA

Apparently the roads originally just had a brick infill, where the tracks had been.

The "station" was just north of the grade crossing of the B&O E-W line.

 

 

This thread actually led me to do some online research yesterday into the operator that used to run through Independence, Kansas, that I mentioned in my last posting.

There is a superb example of the "strip in the road" showing where the tracks were in Independence on 19th Street...

https://www.google.com/maps/@37.2179386,-95.7224001,3a,75y,358.61h,72.77t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1svdZSChXa9MbBbcDuQLWdOg!2e0!7i13312!8i6656

They just lifted the tracks in the late 1940's and put down the concrete, leaving the brick paving either side!

Shame I didn't know about that street when I was there in 1981 - particularly as I was staying in a house not

that far from it....

 

There is a very interesting colour film from the 1940's covering the whole line which is on YouTube..

 

Using a combination of the film, Google Maps and a some pre 1920 county maps that are available online, I was able to follow the whole northern section of the route from Independence to Parsons, even if some of the places have changed out of all recognition in the last 75 years!

 

Will investigate the southern bit today, given the weather.....

 

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Interesting find, in colour as well.

 

Amongst the information I found about the Ohio systems was that the journey from Lima to Toledo, a distance of 72 miles was done in a very credible 2h 15m.

 

A comment about former Pacific Electric trackage started this Interurban discussion, I found this video sampler of it:

 

 

 

 

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18 minutes ago, Wendell1976 said:

Here's a picture of a Morristown & Erie Railway train in Garfield, New Jersey. The train is running down Monroe Street. Garfield is a suburb in the New York City/Newark metropolitan area.

https://www.railpictures.net/photo/752165/

 

Wendell

Idaho, USA 

Is that the very last train? The sign on the front of the locomotive seems to suggest it is.

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34 minutes ago, PhilJ W said:

Is that the very last train? The sign on the front of the locomotive seems to suggest it is.

 

That line has been involved in various legal disputes over the past few years, but the rolling stock that was stored in the yard at the end of the line was recently "siezed" due to the owners inaction and then the stock has been donated on to other bodies (including a Museum).

The yard trackage has been lifted for redevelopment and presumably the street trackage will be lifted as well, if it hasn't already happened.

There is an article on the "Farewell to the Dundee Spur" in the December 2020 edition of Railpace Newsmagazine.

 

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Here's a picture of a Westside Express Service(WES) commuter train in Beaverton, Oregon. The train is running down Southwest(SW) Lombard Avenue at the intersection with Southwest Canyon Road(Oregon Route 8). Tammies Hobbies model train store is a few hundred feet away from this intersection(www.tammieshobbies.com). Beaverton is a suburb of Portland.

https://www.railpictures.net/photo/572080/

 

Wendell

Idaho, USA

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