Abrams Yard

I'll offer a simple 3-word phrase:

Long Hood Forward

Take it for what it is worth.

I passed by Abrams today enroute to Valley Forge National Park today. I saw about six switchers, looked mostly like SW1001s, a high hood GP38-2, a 56xx GP38-2 rebuild and an ex-Conrail GP40-2. I know there is a weekday local, H5A I think, that goes from South Philly to Abrams. How many other locals work out of Abrams Yard? It looks like there is one customer south of Swedesboro that gets tanker cars. Any information would be appreciated.

The man is on the verge of locking this one, I'll betcha. Making insulting comments neither achieves anything or proves one group better than the other. WRT Graniteville, this was the negligence of one or two people, and the competence of one or the other railroad cannot be judged on the actions of one or two. Norfolk Southern's overall abilities can certainly stand on their own! It is a HARD company to work for; they are STRICT and have ZERO tolerance for negligence or incompetence. The two companies that came together to become NS Corporation both had/have their merits. I KNOW! I worked under both Southern and Norfolk & Western management for years. Now if we are going to question the abilities of the SR part of the corporation, THAT I can speak to quite well. For example, did you know that Southern Railway was consistently named in Standard and Poors (and other business venues) as not only one of the best managed railroads in the nation, BUT one of the best managed CORPORATIONS in the US? It never went broke (came close during the Depression), but remained solvent up until the merger in '82. It was also known as "The Road of the Innovators" and the Road of many "firsts". One of these "firsts" was mechanization of track maintenance. While other railroads were still using "gandy dancers", Southern was building machinery to do these jobs. Spike pullers/drivers, track liners, etc. Developed methods for laying ribbon rail. Pioneer in mid-train slave units where they converted old coal tenders to "radio units" for controlling multiple mid-train engines. Cushioned couplers. During the '50's, the ICC introduced a PER-car tariff on grain that was onerous to the extreme. Mr Brosnan, President and CEO at the time, introduced the BIG JOHN hopper, doubling the size of the cars! ICC says, "WHOA!! You can't DO that!" Hauled Southern into court. ICC LOST!!!!!!! "You said 'PER CAR', and you can't just change the rules in mid-stream!" SR was not stupid.

I first hired out on Southern at the Charlotte Roadway Shops in the 70's. Many of the guys that worked under Mr Brosnan were STILL working at Charlotte Roadway and STILL innovating new ways to speed track maintenance. I SAW them in action. During my time at Sou/NS, I, too, contributed to the process making some additions and changes to the machines such as the Kershaw Ballast Regulator either to save money or improve material handling. I saved NS several thousands of $$$ per month on what were labeled "pusher beams" (the aluminum tower sections you see between track lines and liner carts. A "certain" manufacture was charging NS
$900 PER 10 foot section of this stuff which was nothing more than #25 Rohn radio tower that I could buy out of any ham radio catalogue for $89 per section!!!!!! The company liked that!!!!!!!!

And so on. All roads have their merits. People's abilities have nothing to do with where they were born! If you're going to put down the South, then I hope you aren't drinking a Pepsi or a Coca Cola! They were BOTH born in the South: Coca Cola in Atlanta, Ga, Pepsi, New Bern, North Carolina!!! And a few years ago when Conrail was drowning in red ink (just like its predecessors, NYC and the mighty Pennsy), they sent an old Southern CEO up to show 'em how to run a railroad---L. Stanley Crane! Sorry, fellas, I just HAD to do that (opening my leadlined umbrella!). It's all in fun!!!!

Gadfly

jgallaway81 wrote:Electro...

You really don't want to get into a peeing match with us yanks... (three paragraphs deleted due to sensitive nature of comments made)

However I take great personal insult in your comment 'seems as though those of us in the South really do know more about proper railroading'.

After all, wasn't it one of you southern crews that left a switch open in South Carolina a few years back? Doing a quick search on the topic led to this link http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Granitevil ... n_disaster looks like the wreck goes down in history, with its own wikipedia entry.

Ahhh...SPAF!

My point, which I think was missed, but I might be wrong, was not to say that the southern railroaders are worse then northern railroaders, it was to make the point that ANY of us can screw up royally. Might I point out Chase MD? I believe it was a Conrail crew that became responsible for all the drug testing laws on the books now.

And, may I also point to several wrecks out west, most specifically, a soda-ash train that careened down Tehachipi(sp?) and into a community. I'm sure UP had a wreck or two in its history as well.

I will admit, bringing up the SC wreck probably was in bad taste... but in my defense, it was the only wreck I know of that happened down south.

Almost anyone who works for a railroad is a professional railroader, and they should be respected because of their ability to safely control a technological development, that when mishandled can easily have the same force as a couple kilotons of TNT. Not everyone can go to work with "today might be the day I end up killing someone" in the back of their mind. It take a strong constitution to do that and to accept it when it happens. Especially because there is NOTHING the engineer can do about it. By the time the engineer can see a person, there is no way to stop a train in time, there is just TOO MUCH kinetic energy.

Schuylkill Valley wrote:I always thought H5A went to coatsville, I always thought that was CR.AB-22 crew in the Conrail days.

Len.

H5A is the Abrams to South Philadelphia turn. H83 (day) and H4A (night) are the Coatesville turns. H3A does Coatesville on Saturdays or Sundays I believe.

the whole Abrams yard thing is a tough note to swallow. I spent many of nights there watching trains with friends of mine. At the time i was a young guy, and i remember talking to an engineer one night, on how cool it was that we spent time there watching trains, instead of other things we could be doing to get us in trouble. I always found everyone that worked arounf there, very nice. As long as we weren't harming anything, and stayed back to where we were safe, it was all good. The shame about it is now, is i wanted to take my kids there, and there is no place to do so, within the yard space. I understand about traspassing, and i no means to break any laws, but then again, i look at is just another thing i can't do with my kids, to share my younger years.

well you still can go to the lower end of Abrams yard . if you go down Abrams road to the light turn left, follow that road (landmark) school to your left, pass the school then go a mile or so, you come to a houses that are on your left you can see the yard from there , go down the one street, your right along the Seabord yard there. walk to the end of green fence you can see the trains from there.

Len.

Schuylkill Valley wrote:well you still can go to the lower end of Abrams yard . if you go down Abrams road to the light turn left, follow that road (landmark) school to your left, pass the school then go a mile or so, you come to a houses that are on your left you can see the yard from there , go down the one street, your right along the Seabord yard there. walk to the end of green fence you can see the trains from there.

Len.

Len,
Which direction on Abrams Road, and what are the names of the streets?