CR on the Southern Secondary

That historical society/museum place the map was full of stuff like this. It’s in Hamburg PA. They have old cars in the back that carried said coal as well.

not sure why this thread has seen no activity. Saw a Lakewood bound train around 1:30 PM on Friday. Didn't get a good look because I was crossing overhead on I-195.

Didn't all the Southern Secondary fun on this forum move to the 'Delaware and Raritan River Railroad-General Discussion' thread a few months back?

We pretty much moved to the new C&D topic.

Dusting off this topic.

Does anyone know the number designation of the NS train(s) that went down the Southern to the Earle railroad in the early 2000s?

I believe it used to be SA-35

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NS ran directs to Earle? I know one train came in around 2004 with 72 new boxcars, a Conrail Quality EMD (SD60 or something like that) and a CSX YN2 Dash 8 or 9. There’s pictures of the power sitting on the Earle lead somewhere. No clue what symbol it was.

Do any military bases in the United States have regular rail service from "the outside" anymore, or did that end after the end of the Cold War and the need for mass amounts of conventional weapons pretty much disappeared?

Fort Eustis will have CSX move equipment from there to other rail served bases but that’s about I think.

CR2721 wrote: ↑Fri Feb 17, 2023 9:56 pm I believe it used to be SA-35

I thought SA-35 was the run from Browns thru Freehold down to Golds and sometimes getting down to Lakehurst (I thought they were theone's who picked up the "Ocean Grow" fertilizer from the team track at the Gantry)?

They relatively ran opposite SA-31 back when there were two runs a week down this way.

Bracdude181 wrote: ↑Fri Feb 17, 2023 11:21 pm NS ran directs to Earle? I know one train came in around 2004 with 72 new boxcars, a Conrail Quality EMD (SD60 or something like that) and a CSX YN2 Dash 8 or 9. There’s pictures of the power sitting on the Earle lead somewhere. No clue what symbol it was.

I worked with a conductor who'd bought several pictures of an NS job working at Earle. Inside the base. There were white boxcars sitting in their yard tracks next to the train. He said there was a caboose on the end of train. We're trying to find out what job it was that brought the train down there.

The pictures had writing on the back that had been scratched out. Couldn't make out the date but the 20 in the first four of the year. We could see an "NS H" then the rest was scratched out. The pictures were small but we could see the Earle yard and the other distinguishing characteristics of where they were taken.

The train with the CSX engine that you said was in 2004 was brought from and to Browns by SA-35. I remember building up that train for SA-35. The train I'm talking about was brought in and out by NS.

End of nuke storage, or 16 inch shells? Needed special handling and direct (no shuffling of cars) shipment?

The NS locals were based in Croxton or E-Rail and I don't remember any of the ex-Conrail guys who ended up on NS in North Jersey were ever qualified on the Southern Secondary. They may have been good to Browns Yard but that's it. Maybe they got Shared Assets guys to pilot them down.

CJPat wrote: ↑Sat Feb 18, 2023 9:04 am I thought SA-35 was the run from Browns thru Freehold down to Golds and sometimes getting down to Lakehurst (I thought they were theone's who picked up the "Ocean Grow" fertilizer from the team track at the Gantry)?

They relatively ran opposite SA-31 back when there were two runs a week down this way.

Speaking of Ocean Grow, when did they stop shipping it out by rail, and how much were they shipping out? I heard that whoever was selling it was, I believe, a government agency in Ocean County, and they got in legal trouble (or something stupid) for shipping it by rail or something.

Also very strange to hear that SA-35 ran from Browns past Gold's down the switch into Lakehurst. I was under the impression that the last thru train via the switch to Lakehurst from anywhere was back in the late 80's

AceMacSD wrote: ↑Sat Feb 18, 2023 11:27 am I worked with a conductor who'd bought several pictures of an NS job working at Earle. Inside the base. There were white boxcars sitting in their yard tracks next to the train. He said there was a caboose on the end of train. We're trying to find out what job it was that brought the train down there.

If my knowledge of rail regulations is true, if there was a caboose involved, it means that they were certainly carrying weapons/some sort of dangerous material like explosives. Which makes sense if it was the early 2000's, right as the Global War on Terror was beginning

CharlieL wrote: ↑Sat Feb 18, 2023 12:36 pm End of nuke storage, or 16 inch shells? Needed special handling and direct (no shuffling of cars) shipment?

I believe Earle stopped having nukes on their base back in 1992, iirc. I have heard that is around the time when the DoD ceased having nuclear weapons on the surface fleet, aka no more jets on aircraft carriers being equipped with it and whatnot.

I believe Ocean Grow was some kind of Co-Op between Ocean County and their sewage plants and some private entitity that processed it into "fertilizer" or most likely a "Soil Ammendment" (there are very specific regulations regarding when you can call something a fertilizer). The legal trouble came up because the County was challenged in court as unfairly competiting directly with the other private companies generating the product. The end result was basically a cease and desist order. I don't recall the specifics like how much and from what time period to what time period.

I may be wrong about SA-35 making it's way down to Lakehurst, but when I first starting reading Railroad.net in the late '90's (before I chose to join as a member), my knowledge factor was fairly low and I recall getting confused by the existence of two job numbers. The only true difference I recalled was SA-35 typically came down thru Freehold while SA-31 came down thru Red Bank. Perhaps SA-35 only went as far as Golds, but like AceMacSD was recalling, he noted it was SA-35 bringing the ammo cars to Earle's yard (at least that one time), so they must have come up thru Farmingdale.