Old CP Nave Jersey City NJ

[CPSK]

Hello;
I just came across a few old photos I took of the CP Nave interlocking looking south from the Hoboken Ave overpass. These were taken in March 1992.
Looking at the grade going down and under the Newark Ave overpass, and the loop track to the P&H (CP Waldo), I'm wondering what the grade is. Looks like at least 3% from the photo, but I'm not sure what the focal length was, so the perspective may be distorted.
Does anyone know what the actual grade is?

As far as I know, trains from the NDS still come and go through the old Erie tunnel that ends up just north of Marion Jct and head north to North Bergen, The River Line, and Secaucus (Croxton) yard.

I recall the old PC days before the connection from Marion Jct to westbound P&H to Hack was completed, and trains would have to make a reverse move to get into Kearny if they weren't going through the tunnel to CP Nave and over the loop to Waldo.

here are the photos:







FW

[RDGTRANSMUSEUM]

i looked at your pics,worked in train service in that area in the 1990's. i do not remember any 3.00 grades. i will check my old operators books.

[CPSK]

My guesstimate is probably way off, since I most likely used a telephoto lens for all of the shots. I don't really know what a 1% grade looks like, let alone a 3%.
It just looks way more than any mainline grade (except the Horseshoe Curve) I've ever seen, aside from LIRR and subway.

FW

[SooLineRob]

Huh...

This topic showed up at the same time I'm restoring my basement to it's pre-flood condition. And in one of "the boxes" I found the Conrail River Line Track Profile.

The immediate area depicted in the photos above:

River Line South grade, southbound beginning at the Hoboken Ave grade crossing is 1.72% ascending to NJ State Hwy 139/Hoboken Ave OH Bridge (Holland Tunnel approach, where the top photo was taken from), then descending 1.64% to south limits CP Nave, then 1.4% ascending from south limits CP Nave to CP Waldo.

It sounds like a roller coaster ride; but the short section of 1.64% descending grade was only ~12 car lengths long. Not long enough to have an effect on train handling, unless the southbound was continuing to the National Docks Secondary and Oak Island Yard.

In reality, it was less than 1 mile from Hoboken Ave to CP Waldo, with a 15 MPH permanent speed restriction between Nave and Waldo. Southbounds would "stretch brake" to slow down for the 15 MPH in order to protect themselves from the natives that launched their offensive attacks from the housing projects north of Paterson Plank Road. Once slowed down, southbounds would simply release the air brakes, and the uphill pull to Waldo would keep the train stretched. Northbounds (at least when I went north!) coming down from Waldo would do the same thing; stretch brake downhill until the hind end cleared Nave, then release the air and keep pulling on the train, gradually accelerating up to track speed of 25 MPH and keeping the train stretched. While the grade seems quite steep, it wasn't enough to cause regular problems.

I do recall one night I was working a North Bergen Yard to NJ Transit Pascack Valley Line local, WPNB-39. We headed south as usual, and River Line told us we had to shove a stalled train up the hill onto the P&H Line. We were the most convenient/timely solution as all the South Kearney yard jobs were unavailable for awhile. A late evening through freight, possibly SEMT, lost one of their two locos and stalled with their head end IN Journal Square PATH station, a "smelly" problem. Their hind end was still north of CP Nave, so we coupled up to their hind end (with our 2 GP38's and ~20 cars), and shoved them west of Waldo, where we cut away "on the fly", followed them to Marion, and headed north and west for NJT land.

Stalls were rare, but they did happen when a southbound loco consist went lame.

P.S. Thanks for the trip down Memory Lane.

[RDGTRANSMUSEUM]

Thanks for the memories SooLineRob. I just came from a birthday party and somone was asking me about my railroad days. The Hoboken war zone stories became the topic real quick. I told them it was so bad in the projects that the trains go a different route today! We used to go through there at 25 mph to keep em stretched. Screw that 15 mph crap. I can still picture the tires lined up on the rails.
One day Von-Holten himself called me to a flagging job in the projects.Yep,I took the call! You ain't lived until you go thru that kinda stuff on the railroad. ........... Ah, the good old days.

[CPSK]

SooLineRob; Great post, and thanks for the grade info. I'll try to get mine correct in my Trainz route. Thanks RDGTRANSMUSEUM, for your addition too. It's always great to hear it from those who actually worked the RR.

I remember those days too, but not from the employee point of view. I was listening on my scanner. First one I built was a Heathkit, and it was still Penn Central. I had to do a lot of legwork just to get the radio frequencies, as the Radio Shack guide didn't publish RR's by name, just a group of frequencies. Not like today with the Internet<g>.

I do remember well the "war zone" and the "projects". It must have caused a lot of stress to crews when they had to traverse that area. Worse if you had to leave the train.
I lived in Teaneck, near MP 09. During PC days, the signal marked "10" was under the State St. bridge. I, and PC crews used to call it "CP10", but it wasn't a CP until CR installed the interlocking at what is now CP10 (which of course is actually around MP 11).
Kids would sometimes try to build barricades on the track out of old RR ties, but most of the time the trains were able to get past without stopping. PC trains ran very slow, mostly 10mph in those days. It was really depressing to see a mainline track degraded so badly. CR was a breath of "fresh air".

I visited the CP Nave area only that once. I drove around some pretty bad parts before locating a bridge where I could get the photos. I didn't wait around for a train, as I felt pretty nervous being there. As a matter of fact, when I went back to where I had parked my Camaro, a cop was looking at the vehicle. I was on Overlook ave I think, on the hill going up to the overpass. I thought maybe I was illegally parked, but he just told me that a lot of stolen cars were winding up in that area.

I have ridden PATH through Journal Square. It was a great place to catch CR trains on the P&H. Haven't been on PATH for a very long time now.

SooLine; After you got done with shoving the SEMT (or whatever train) west, did you take the old east wye into Marion to Secaucus, or was that track already gone by then?
Otherwise, I suppose you had to do a reverse into the west wye, then run around your train and pull it up into Secaucus.
I don't remember when the west wye was built, and the east wye removed, but i used to see the construction in that area when I rode NJT from Hoboken to Hackensack.

Later, I lived in Westwood, in an apartment complex right next to the Pascack Valley line. I used to catch the local freight on a Saturday sometimes.

Looking at MS Live maps, I see that the track on the old loop from Nave to P&H westbound (don't know what they called the loop track) has been removed, but the bridge is still in place.
Of course the stretch from Nave to Hoboken is gone, leaving only the loop from the NDS to the old Erie tunnel. I assume that this track still sees some service today.
I am thinking about taking the HBLR south from Hoboken to its terminus in Bayonne just to have a look at some of the NDS, but it's probably something I don't really need to see in person. The MS Live maps are excellent in this area; even better than Google Earth maps.

Again; Thanks for this great info and story.

FW