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  • Blissville Yard

  • Discussion related to NYAR operations on Long Island. Official web site can be found here: www.anacostia.com/nyar/nyar.html. Also includes discussion related to NYNJ Rail, the carfloat operation successor to New York Cross Harbor that connects with NYAR.
Discussion related to NYAR operations on Long Island. Official web site can be found here: www.anacostia.com/nyar/nyar.html. Also includes discussion related to NYNJ Rail, the carfloat operation successor to New York Cross Harbor that connects with NYAR.
 #69449  by Legio X
 
Can anyone describe the layout of the abandoned Blissville Yard and it's history over the past 20 years or so?

 #71168  by Legio X
 
Where's the Duke for this one???

 #83876  by jhdeasy
 
Can't answer your questions, but I do have one photo of the area. It shows LIRR lightweight parlor cars 2080 SPEONK, 2075 SAGITKOS and 2078 SETAUKET (all former NH 6 roomette 4 double bedroom 6 section sleepers) in the yard at Blissville circa 1975.

Image

 #83883  by Legio X
 
So Blissville Yard was used for passenger equipment storage rather than freight operations?

 #83911  by DogBert
 
I thought it was a freight yard, and the passenger cars were just stored there after being pulled from service, much like how all those old cars ended up being stored in yard A through the 90's...

 #83989  by jhdeasy
 
I lived in Astoria - Long Island City from 1954 to 1976 ... I remember Blissvile as a small freight yard ... those parlor cars were stored there either during the off season or while awaiting disposition ... it is the only photo I have of Blissville ... while visiting New York City about a year ago, I drive thru Blissville and tried to determine the exact spot where that photo was taken ... I could not do it with certainty.
 #84014  by freightguy
 
Blissville is supposed to rebuilt by the city for the New York and Atlantic. This was part of the concession for losing Yard A for the East Side Access Project in conjuction with service to Grand Central terminal. The rebuilding of Blissville is slated for the spring/summer of 2005. Don't hold your breath but supposedly they are working on Getty Oil as a costumer for ethanol( an additive in gasoline). This is the tank farm right next to Blissville.

 #84144  by Legio X
 
That would be nice to get Getty as a customer....any new business is good business. I wonder what the configuration of the yard will be, after re-construction, access at both ends, or stub-ended? What is the configuration of the yard now, in it's mothballed state?

 #84189  by DogBert
 
The yard is currently configured as a home to many trees and tall weeds. :-D

I think it connects at both ends. last time I was there maybe 2 years ago there were loads of shopping carts and homeless camped on the other side of the ROW.

 #84852  by badneighbor
 
Ray- nice link, too bad the phots werent thumbnails..a little small on viewing details, but very informative.
 #84953  by dukeoq
 
Someone call the DUKE?
Bliss Yard in the sixties was used as a storage yard for Phelps Dodge cars as well as cars for customers in the vicinity of the yard.
The day crew brought cars from Yard A for PD as well as for the others. They switched and serviced sidings east on #2 track including Van Iderstine and as far as Marlin Warehouse, stopping short of Penny Bridge.
Several customers on the north side included other VI tracks, A lumber company and a chemical company. The names escape me at the moment.
The afternoon job brought more cars to Bliss yard and the first order of business was to make up the train for the Laurel Hill job, who switched Phelps Dodge.
Phelps Dodge siding had no room to switch so that crew had to have thier train in spot order so that the job could be done efficiantly.
After the last passenger train left LIC in the afternoon, the Bliss job headed west on secondary C to reverse into Murer's siding which serviced industries that fronted on Borden Ave.
One by one, these customers all closed down to make room for TV studios and other businesses that had no need of rail delivery.

 #85021  by DogBert
 
This might also help:
http://home.att.net/~Berliner-Ultrasoni ... l#blissvil

couldn't find blissville itself - that thumbnail right there is an 1897 map of a yard that started with a W. I suspect it was abandoned a very, very long time ago because there is almost no trace of it today (the buildings all the south side of borden where fresh direct is are on the spot the yard was on - though when montauk steel was an abandoned warehouse I went into that lot and have a photo somewhere of a set of rails running between buildings ending at the building walls!

In any case, berliner's got a load of info on that site...
 #85051  by dukeoq
 
Dogbert, the yard pictured on the diagram is Long Island City Passenger Yard and the one along Borden Ave was known as the Wheelspur yard.
This was before my time (1957) but fellow workers told how PRR trains were made up there and taken to Sunnyside for Penn crews to take over.
Those trains were the long distance trains bound for Florida, Chicago, etc.
This was discontinued in the late forties or early fifties. That period of time was during bankruptcy, PRR takeover and reorganization.
The track into Montauk Steel was actually a continuation of the switching lead from the Passenger Yard. Case Paper was also off this lead.
Bliss Yard was to the east on this diagram,in the lower right hand corner, across Dutch Kills Creek.

 #85061  by lirrmike
 
Bliss Yard has been cleaned up a bit. There was a shopping cart 'city' in the middle. I once walked through the old tracks trying to get the layout. On a side note, at the old PhelpsDodge site, construction has begun with pilings being put in. Don't know what or who is going in there or if they will get rail service. I have always said with UPS across the street, piggyback service would be perfect for a yard there.

Mike
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