Your Ultimate NJ Railfan Calendar

Time travel photo question -- If you were commissioned by a publishing house to provide photos of any rail shots in New Jersey, from say 1950 to the present, what would be your three most wished shots that you would have personally taken?

My pick:

1) DL&W Phoebe Snow #3 in Summit (without the fence between tracks one and two), complete with Nickle Plate sleeper.

2) CNJ RDC pair on trestle of High Bridge Branch on a sunny late spring or early summer clear day.

3) LV, Black Diamond racing westbound east of Flemington Jct. on clear day with whispy snow on the tracks.

Runner up: one of the many diesel and MU cab rides on the DL&W on which I never had a camera with me.

1. The engine change at South Amboy.

2. A CNJ Mikado dragging a freight up Fanwood Hill.

3. A GG1, at speed with the Broadway or the Congressional, near Rahway.


Runners up: A CNJ ferry with a pre-World Trade Center skyline; the E'Port Shops...so many others.....

My 3 picks:

1) EL Greenwood Lake Branch NORTH of Pompton Jct.

2) EL's Phoebe Snow on the Cutoff

3) Even though I'm a die-hard EL fan I'd like to see a ground-level shot
of a CNJ train working across the Nesquehoning Trestle.

My three picks:

1. L&HR RS3 with 20 freight cars waiting at Andover Jct. for a DL&W passenger train heading to Branchville led by a Trainmaster.


2. PRSL 0-6-0 switcher drilling boxcars filled with Christmas trees into the Freeway Lumber Yard in Mt. Ephraim on the Grenloch Branch.


3. Waiting in West Haddonfield Station for my Grandfather; watching the operator in Vernon Tower pulling the Armstrong levers for the Bridge Train led by a BS-16ms Baldwin engine.


Runner-up: Seeing the Phoebe Snow cross the Paulinskill Viaduct on the Lackawanna Cut-Off.

David wrote:My three picks:

1. L&HR RS3 with 20 freight cars waiting at Andover Jct. for a DL&W passenger train heading to Branchville led by a Trainmaster.


2. PRSL 0-6-0 switcher drilling boxcars filled with Christmas trees into the Freeway Lumber Yard in Mt. Ephraim on the Grenloch Branch.


3. Waiting in West Haddonfield Station for my Grandfather; watching the operator in Vernon Tower pulling the Armstrong levers for the Bridge Train led by a BS-16ms Baldwin engine.


Runner-up: Seeing the Phoebe Snow cross the Paulinskill Viaduct on the Lackawanna Cut-Off.

Dave,

I might be able to help with the EL at Andover Jct. One of the members of the Volunteer Rail Association has made a video which shows the EL in many areas of Sussex County.

Ken

1. A GG-1 pre-1950.

2. A GG-1 post-PennCentral.

and, of course,

3. Rahway Valley #15 steaming through rural Springfield.

OK, here we go:

1. Tuckahoe - 1965. A single RDC from Ocean City meets up with a total of 3 RDC's from Wildwood and Cape May at this once busy junction in South Jersey. I'd like to shoot from the route 49 overpass, and get the two sets before they joined up, and then once again leaving after being reunited to head north as a single RDC train to Winslow and beyond. This shot has been done before, probably hundreds of times, but I'd like to have it in my very own collection.

2. Tuckahoe again - 1962. The first "Beesley's Point Extra" rolling south destined for the new Beesley's Point power plant at Palermo, about to enter the Ocean City Branch at Tuckahoe off the Cape May Branch. This scene would be replicated thousands of times over the next 45 years, ceasing only after the Beesley's Point Generating Station closes in 2007 (this is happening). This event (construction of that plant) saved that line from abandonment between Winslow and Palermo in 1983, as it was the only industry left between those two points after freight service south of Tuckahoe ended.

3. Grenloch, NJ - November, 1973. Yard runner 22-A departs Grenloch, NJ northbound for the last time, headed to Camden. This was something I always wished I could have witnessed, and is something I'd even more like to simply have a photographic record of. But alas, no one else though to do this, because photographs like this which I have searched for for years now don't exist...I wish I had them...

Take care guys.

Mike DiMunno

The possibilities on this one are endless!

1. The Raritan River Railroad when there was still passenger service along the line.

2. Rail service on Wildwood Island.

3. New Brunswick Station when all the industrial spurs and switches near the station were still in operation.

Runners Up: An electrified Amboy Secondary and Browns Yard, Passenger service on the Newark Branch

I am really glad I managed to get a pic of an NJT Boonton Line train at Benson Street Station prior to its closing, otherwise that would have made the list too!

I want to once again photograph the Acela's that are sitting on the lead to Metal Management ( formerly called Naporano ). These units were all sidelined with defective brakes and other components back in 2006 and sat in storage at Wilmington the past 20 years before finally getting moved to scrap.

Oh wait, i am in the future again.

Damn, i hate when i do that. I was looking back on 2026 again.

LOL

Wow,

railroadcarmover you really threw me for a loop there! I've heard of certain drugs that give you flashbacks but what do you take (or do) to get flashforwards??

Well until we meet again, for the first time, I'll be looking forward to meeting you.

There MUST be more!

NJT ALP46 with a solid 10 car consist (no matter the model) hauling ass down the NEC at 100 MPH

A GG1 in the same location doing the same thing

CNJ 100 plus car freight needing a helper to get up the Middletown hill

(as a side note, and off topic, the other day, SA42 had like 68 cars heading for the Amboy Sec, waiting at Wood - there still is big freight on the Coast Line!!)

1. Double ended Baldwin in the tangerine and blue scheme, crossing the Newark Bay Bridge.

2. Double headed GG-1's in Brunswick Green and five stripes, pulling a freight out of Waverly onto the NEC

3. LV, either PA's in Cornell Red with black striping or the snowbird scheme, pulling a train across the Delaware River.

Great photodreams, Guys!

Kilroy, I vaguely remember the CNJ and LV scenes you mention. Fully agree with them.

Another thought related to this (not starting another thread): What normal rail scenes are we seeing today that someday in the future we would give our eye teeth to go back in time and see/photograph again? There are some youngsters out there who are getting rail-etched in their minds today with scenes that are just daily normal ones to the rest of us. For the good of the hobby, let's hope so.

Although hard to see, the active crossing shanty and man (sometimes two) at Monmouth Park racetrack.

I hate to say it, but the Dinky - the PJ and B Princeton Jct and Back

Union tower operator, and tower operators in general (now with Terminal tower transferred to West end, is Brielle the only one left on NJT???)

Comet 1's, comaros, and the CNJ '40's

T boxes

Maybe this should be another thread???