Railroad Forums 

  • Anybody has any track Diagrams of the reading trackage?

  • Discussion Related to the Reading Company 1833-1976 and it's predecessors Philadelphia and Reading Rail Road and then the Philadelphia and Reading Railway.
Discussion Related to the Reading Company 1833-1976 and it's predecessors Philadelphia and Reading Rail Road and then the Philadelphia and Reading Railway.

Moderator: Franklin Gowen

 #390644  by Franklin Gowen
 
Yes. What areas, exactly, are you interested in seeing diagrams for? I have several Conrail "Maintenance Program and Track Chart" books dating from the 1990s. My Philadelphia Division book was printed in 1999, just before Conrail was broken up between NS and CSX. They don't just show signals, but also track speeds, slow orders, intersecting streets (at grade and otherwise), interlockings, age of the rails, etc. It's one of my most useful railfan documents.

I only wish I had a copy of the same documents for the ex-RDG trackage owned & operated by SEPTA, but that's simply not available to railfans. SEPTA Railroad Division management must hoard that kind of stuff like a dragon perched on his pile of stolen gold and jewels. :wink:

 #391168  by van2005ko
 
Mainly Philadelphia division branches, with the mainline!
 #391192  by westernfalls
 
van2005ko wrote:Diagrams which features signals
Short of engineering plans from the signal department, this sort of diagram
was sketched out by any employe who wanted to get qualified over the territory.
In the late Reading Company days, and probably into Conrail, a crude set of such
diagrams was made by the "official track car driver" who spent his days hi-railing
the railroad and updating his zeroxed sheets. In earlier decades, there was an
employe who made small booklets of interlocking diagrams which he sold to his
co-workers. Some of these items can be found at auction in boxes marked
"Reading Company Ephemera". What level of detail are you looking for?

 #391562  by van2005ko
 
Well any one has any scan-in images of the these diagrams of the reading mainline?

thank you
Last edited by van2005ko on Thu Aug 23, 2007 12:48 pm, edited 1 time in total.

 #391614  by rrbluesman
 
You should check out the reading compnay technical and histocial society web page. They have some amount of track diagrams there
 #391882  by geep39
 
Hold on about those sheets. The RCT&HS archives are a bit "under the weather" right now. They were just moved up to the Hamburg museum site, and need to be sorted and made available.

What you may be looking for are "quarter mile sheets", which cover a quarter mile of railroad. For a given stretch of railroad, there are a LOT of these things, and I assure you, the search is exhausting, and each sheet covers just portions of what you're looking for. Add to that the revisions made every time there was a change, and WHEW!

"Be careful what you ask for, you may get it!"

 #391959  by van2005ko
 
Archives, in addition to the photos, the RCT&HS has assembled an enormous collection of maps, blueprints and files. Originally the bulk of the company's Mechanical Department files, rescued by RCT&HS from the scrap-heap, the collection continues to grow with additional "finds" in forgotten places, and from individual donations. The collection has developed into a library filled with literally thousands of items, and supplies data for "Bee Line" articles and reference. Please note: at this time, we unfortunately do not have the resources or staffing to honor individual requests for research and materials. In the future, we hope to have a dedicated facility within our proposed museum that will allow public access to the archive collection.
Its been on there for several years!!

if they need the resources, then go with bluehost as their website host, or lurnerpages as they both seem to have seamless hosting space!!
Last edited by van2005ko on Fri Apr 27, 2007 12:56 pm, edited 1 time in total.

 #391963  by metman499
 
The Railroad Museum of PA has some quartermile sheets. I am uncertain as to whether they are CNJ or Reading. You may want to write a letter to Kurt Bell, the archivist there, to see if they have them and if so if you can access them. In terms of your post regarding web hosting I am not quite sure what you are referring to. Their website has worked fine for years and hosting portions of a corporate archive gets very unwieldy very quickly. It would amount to a massive scanning project which is difficult to do with volunteer labor and very expensive to do with paid staff.

 #394719  by van2005ko
 
so I take it they are not available online...

 #394762  by Franklin Gowen
 
Not on the web? That's right (sadly).

I might be able to scan a few pages of my ex-CR book concerning the former Reading main line. It's not going to be a fast process; I'm under a great deal of time pressure from other obligations. What areas from Belmont/West Falls to Reading are you most interested in? I might not be able to scan and upload the entire 60-some miles.

If there's a different area you'd like to see instead, please say so; I don't want to duplicate my efforts.

 #395418  by geep39
 
Van:

I'm afraid you're not getting it. Quarter-mile sheets are not 8-1/2 x 11 size. They're quite a bit larger--THAT'S why you're not likely to see them online for ANY railroad put up by anybody. If you do happen to find any online, consider them a great gift. I think they're about 12 X 36 or so, depending on the railroad, and usually bound up into a book.Your best bet is to go to one of the large rairloadiana-type train meets and look for them. One meet like that is the Allentown Dieruff High School meet the last Sunday in September. Usually meets that are held by NRHS chapters are a good bet for such things (as is the above-mentioned Allentown meet). There seem to be a lot of Conrail, and maybe you'll find a Reading if you're lucky.

Again these sheets are huge, and many may just show manholes or mabe a spur, with just a few showing signals or junctions. There are so many of these things, most of them showing so little, which is why so few are scanned and on line.

 #400208  by Schuylkill Valley
 
Hey Van, Your in luck!
I have a compleat system of real Reading Company Blue Prints from West Falls to Port Richmond. they are all 100% real. There all diffrent dates .

Len.
 #1355213  by Ohiopyle
 
Howdy all
I have a large number (150+) of track diagrams and circuit schematics from the Reading, PRR and the Conrail eras. Some of these items are 90 inches long, and date from 1938 to 1984. I am heading to the Golden Spike Transportation Artifact show in Gaithersburg this Sunday. Here is a sampling of documents. Does anyone have any knowledge of this show?


Road city state title type Date width height # of sheets

Reading Master Street to Fairhill Jct Circuits Jun-54 40 18 sheets 12-31
NYCRR Hamlet IN Repeater Relay indication light and Annunciator Circuts Dec-44 28 16.5 11 sheets
Reading Tamaqua PA Tamaqua Interlocking Track Plan track schematic Nov-75 38 16.5
PRR Northumberland PA Kase Interlocking Control Machine May-78 80 16.5 2 sheets
Reading Zionsville PA Station Road proposed crossing protection wiring schematic Jul-54 40 17.25 bundled as 3 sheets
Reading Zionsville PA Church road proposed crossing protection wiring schematic Jul-54 40 17.25 bundled as 3 sheets
Reading Dillinger PA Public Road wiring schematic Jul-54 40 17.25 bundled as 3 sheets
Reading Milton IN Lewisburg to Hannah Track Circuit Plan Circuit Plan Apr-73 25.5 11 3 sheets
Erie & Lac Pittston PA Bllomsburg Branch Old Forge to W. Pittstown Location plan 39 18
Erie & Lac Scranton PA W of Bridge 60 Scranton to Old forge Location plan 39 18
Reading Palmyra PA Palmyra to Swatara Track Circuit Plan Track Circuit Plan Jan-61 39 16.5 3 sheets
Reading Port Clinton PA Belt Line Junction - Port Clinton Track Circuit Track Circuit Plan Aug-78 40 17.5 2 sheets
Reading Carlisle PA Carlisle jct to Lees Cross roads LC 333 Track Circuit Plan Oct-81 40 16.5 2 sheets
Reading Sunbury PA Sunbury LC 1314 Track Circuit Plan Mar-81 40 16.5