Housatonic Railroad Thread (Maybrook, Berkshire, Pittsfield)

[F-line to Dudley via Park]

In the news: New Milford Spectrum

Housatonic line scrutinized after train derailment
...

Can we get rid of them on some technicality? Trafficking in stolen CT rail ties?

Nope. Their trackage rights agreement is nearly unbreakable.

The only way to get rid of them is to make the Godfather offer to liquidate Maybrook Properties and the privately-owned track. Then the last shell company is just the operating railroad, Danbury Terminal, and there are no more cash swap shennanigans to be had and no more ransom offers to pull for the scrap value of the railroad. Since the management is only in it to loot the company, not grow the business...they'll just divide the sale proceeds amongst the execs instead of re-investing it in the railroad like the $18M in Massachusetts is making rich execs richer instead of going back into the railroad. When that payout is done with and the company is reduced to Danbury Terminal there are only 2 remaining get-rich-quick schemes to be had:

1. Selling their local trackage rights on the Maybrook to P&W first.

2. Selling out entirely on the Berkshire to some other carrier, and folding the tent while splitting the proceeds.


That's the natural sequence of events that'll get them to bugger out of town. Unfortunately it's going to take an overpay by CT to buy out Maybrook Properties and fix up the Maybrook Line enough for P&W to reliably operate it, and then there'll be a second-round state-of-repair bailout when they're recruiting the next carrier that replaces Danbury Terminal. But they won't malinger forever out of pure joy of running a railroad. Once there are no money games left to play management will remove HRRC from the equation by their own voluntary action. It's just going to take awhile for sequence of cash-outs to reach its logical conclusion. In all likelihood they're still going to be around in 2020, although it might be just Danbury Terminal at that point with only those last 1-2 cash-out moves left to go.

[J.D. Lang]

The Housatonic does not interchange any cars with the P/W as Ridgefielder says. From what I know as of now these are the current customers on the south end(New Milford & below). Maybrook Line: Furthest East customer is a Lumber yard in Botsford. As noted in previous posts everything between Botsford and Derby Junction is OOS because of very poor track conditions. The next one is Rand Whitney Container in Newtown then the lumber reload center in Hawleyville which is there biggest customer down there and is also owned by one of their shell companies. In Danbury is the Winters Bros. construction debris transload facility. Next north of Berkshire Junction is Pharmco which handles the chemicals then up to New Milford to Kimberly Clark. There used to be Quality Food Oils just below KC that used to get quite a few tank cars of vegtable/corn syrup but they packed up their bags a couple of years ago and moved out of town. All of this traffic moves up to or down from Canaan. From Canaan all of this traffic goes to Pittsfield along with all of the stuff from Canaan north.

Plans to upgrade the line have been discussed for years, and recently gained traction when funding was approved by Massachusetts and Connecticut. Work is already underway to replace six miles of track and 11,000 wood ties in Kent for $1.6 million, which the state and Housatonic Rail are funding.

I can't believe that the state is helping them with this. Maybe that welded rail that's been laying around for 10yrs. will finally be installed around Hatch Pond.

J Lang

[Gilbert B Norman]

Mr.Lang, have I got it straight that even though P&W has trackage rights over CDOT Norwalk-Danbury, they do not handle interline traffic to Housy? Therefore, all traffic, save whatever local traffic there might be, is interchanged with CSX at Pittsfield. What traffic there is on the "inverted T" comprising what remains of the Maybrook line is handled Danbury-Pittsfield by Gaylordsville where the wreck noted at earlier posts occurred two weeks ago, and along Hatch Pond where there has been "a spill or two" and the welded rail awaits laying.

What am I missing?

Now regarding Maybrook Properties; the only concern with that name Mr. Google knows of is a real estate concern in the UK. So any enlightenment regarding such as relating to the HRR would be appreciated.

[F-line to Dudley via Park]

Here's a thick legalese summary from the Railroad Retirement Board of the old ICC filings that created Maybrook Properties: https://www.rrb.gov/pdf/bcd/bcd93-17.pdf" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;.

It's Maybrook as owner and Danbury Terminal as operator. You'll see those two names on any STB filings and any FRA documentation concerning the privately-owned trackage in CT.

[Greg Moore]

Several pages back a good point was made regarding that for MA at least, it's probably faster/cheaper/easier to add service from ALB to Pittsfield than try to restore service to GCT up the Berkshire line.

While I still think someday there's value in GCT->north service (I'd start with Friday night service up, Sunday night back for the weekend commuters) I think the general point above is a good one. That I think properly marketed, even with the current slow times, ALB-East has potential.

Not much, but 1 or 2 trains a day I think could make sense.

And eventually bring back service on the Housy... Not so much NYC to Mass, as much as NW CT to Albany and points west and north and to Boston.

[J.D. Lang]

Mr.Lang, have I got it straight that even though P&W has trackage rights over CDOT Norwalk-Danbury, they do not handle interline traffic to Housy? Therefore, all traffic, save whatever local traffic there might be, is interchanged with CSX at Pittsfield. What traffic there is on the "inverted T" comprising what remains of the Maybrook line is handled Danbury-Pittsfield by Gaylordsville where the wreck noted at earlier posts occurred two weeks ago, and along Hatch Pond where there has been "a spill or two" and the welded rail awaits laying.

What am I missing?

Your not missing anything. You have it right. P/W runs a stone train to Tilcon's Danbury plant. They may handle a car or two for the remaning customers on MN's Danbury branch. There is no interline interchange between Housatonic and P/W. All of Housatonic's customers traffic goes to/from Pittsfield Mass. going up through the entire length of the Berkshire Line.

J Lang

[Gilbert B Norman]

Thanks Mr. Lang--

I guess interchanging traffic only with CSX at Pittsfield will result in a more favorable line haul division for both Housy and Chessie. After all, who cares when one gets a hopper car full of plastic pellets, a tank of "rubbing alcohol", or pulp for Kimberly Clark @ New Milford.

The photos included with the New Milford newspaper's article about the Gaylordsville derailment show cars that appear to be in garbage service. Regarding my conversation with the 'Lum" a few classes behind me (who joined the SKS Faculty after serving in 'Nam and getting "the right stuff", i.e. degrees to teach, is now retired and resides in Kent). All I could say to him regarding the "harmless wreck" was "Nobby, if this excuse for a railroad ever starts handling HAZMAT, you could well have a Mègantic here in the valley".

[F-line to Dudley via Park]

CSX has a small yard of its own in Pittsfield and some local customers clustered around there, and also uses Pittsfield as the staging point for the helper locomotives it attaches/detaches to get the intermodal trains up and down the steep sustained grades on the B&A through the Berkshires. So unlike any other interchange point on the Housy system Pittsfield is staffed by CSX enough hours of the day that it costs them little and carries almost no time penalty to be able go fetch a few token carloads for the interchange whenever it's convenient. It's virtually an at-will choice, which can't be said of the south end of the system. Danbury is end of the line for P&W, with point of origin at Cedar Hill in New Haven being a CSX yard where P&W has strict limitations on permissible activity. Danbury, like the rest of Central CT, is for the most part a two-step P&W job that pivots off the Worcester-New Haven daily and a layover at Cedar Hill for parting out that Worcester train for the CT locals. Too inflexible an arrangement for them to bother staging an interchange unless there's orders of magnitude more than a measly few cars per week at stake. Same reason PAS has absolutely nothing to gain from activating its long-mothballed Derby interchange the way their territorial outskirts and meager frequencies south of Waterbury are structured.

[DutchRailnut]

for information the Danbury Terminal Railroad ceased to exist in 1996 .
http://www.stb.dot.gov/Decisions/readin ... enDocument" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[merrick1]

CSX has a small yard of its own in Pittsfield and some local customers clustered around there, and also uses Pittsfield as the staging point for the helper locomotives it attaches/detaches to get the intermodal trains up and down the steep sustained grades on the B&A through the Berkshires.

Has CSX brought back the helpers in Pittsfield? I grew up in Pittsfield and I remember the helpers but ConRail stopped using them in the 1980's. When the line was single tracked CP 150 was configured in a way that it would have made it difficult to switch the helpers. I moved away 22 years ago so I don't know what's going on now.

[F-line to Dudley via Park]

CSX has a small yard of its own in Pittsfield and some local customers clustered around there, and also uses Pittsfield as the staging point for the helper locomotives it attaches/detaches to get the intermodal trains up and down the steep sustained grades on the B&A through the Berkshires.

Has CSX brought back the helpers in Pittsfield? I grew up in Pittsfield and I remember the helpers but ConRail stopped using them in the 1980's. When the line was single tracked CP 150 was configured in a way that it would have made it difficult to switch the helpers. I moved away 22 years ago so I don't know what's going on now.

Very recent development. Job postings for a brand new Monday-Friday Pittsfield-based helper crew went up in November. Haven't seen any photographic evidence on NErail yet, but the job should've been in action for a few months now. They brought back the helpers to lift the tonnage restriction over the Berkshire grades and combine the daily IM schedule on the B&A into fewer trains to alleviate a looming yard bottleneck.

[DutchRailnut]

think were getting mighty off course here...

[Gilbert B Norman]

Mr. Railnut raises a point with which I wholly concur. How the B&A handles the HRR interchange traffic is not of concern here. Has CSX assigned adequate motive power is of no concern at this topic.

If Housy delivers their cars to the CSX interchange with "reasonable dispatch", then they have fulfilled their part of the transportation conttact.

Let it be noted that I'm not sticking up for this excuse for a railroad. I'm simply reciting AAR Freight Mandorty rules as I recall such.

[F-line to Dudley via Park]

Umm...no. It goes directly and immediately to the point raised earlier about there being no interchange potential on the south end of the Housy system because frequencies, frequencies, frequencies of the would-be interchange partners aren't robust enough at points that are the very outskirts of the P&W and PAS systems. Everything runs through Pittsfield because CSX has daily local staff and power presence--more than ever now--, can pick up at-will, and picks up on its heaviest-use mainline. Whatever P&W and PAS loads make their way to HRRC currently have more flex and upside being handed to CSX on the constant conveyor belt through Pittsfield vs. being hand-delivered themselves. That goes directly to discussion of HRRC's business prospects and where a probable successor can re-grow business on the corridor, and goes a lot further than passively meeting obligations. A carrier who wanted to take better advantage of Pittsfield interchange has a lot to gain from CSX by generating more carloads there. Much like Grafton & Upton is doing so at North Grafton interchange on the CSX conveyor belt. Growth wouldn't happen by chasing opportunities at Danbury Yard that would be niche at best for P&W interchanging or expending too much energy at Derby Jct. for PAS exchanges that will never materialize at all because they simply don't run that far down the Waterbury Branch often enough.


If Dutch finds that too boring, he's free to suggest another line of discussion instead of shushing an active sidebar wholly relevant to the overall discussion.

[Jeff Smith]

Okay then, let's leave it at: "asked and answered" and move on. We know who, what when, where, and why.