New York Central Penn Yan Branch

That Keuka Lake Memories book has that trolley information. The interchange was at the Penn Yan NC/PRR station off Elm Street. Basin Street is or was too steep of a grade on each side, whew. Plus the grade up Water Street is strenuous. Shouldn't this be in the PRR or NYC thread? FGLK still services PY Tuesday Thursday if that?

It shows up in the NYC Forum as a redirect to the NYS forum. It definitely sees more action over here... so you can access the thread in either the NYC or NYS. As to whether it should also show in the PRR forum, that is up to Otto.

BWP

Lately, I believe, the FGLK PY business has been on an "as needed" basis. Most of the action has been Watkins Glen oriented -- down between 8 and 9 AM and back up late afternoon, except for a couple of weeks when there was track work going on. Business must be picking up at the salt plants as the local has been running almost daily with even some weekend runs mixed in. NS sould be seeing some of this in their HO-6 loadouts.

Poppyl

K4Pacific wrote:That Keuka Lake Memories book has that trolley information. The interchange was at the Penn Yan NC/PRR station off Elm Street. Basin Street is or was too steep of a grade on each side, whew. Plus the grade up Water Street is strenuous. Shouldn't this be in the PRR or NYC thread? FGLK still services PY Tuesday Thursday if that?

FGLK may have continued the Tuesday and Thursday service tradition until the tracks to PY were taken out of service in the late 90's. The fall they were taken out of service they stwitched out record numbers of covered hoppers at Yates Blodget. All the tracks (including the old Agway siding which was still intact as I recall) were occupied North of Elm St with at least several cars each, and the train ran nearly Daily for a couple weeks.

When service was restored (around '02, I think) They began switching cars as far north as Clearplas (now Silgan) containers. Now the only day I haven't seen a train in town is Sunday. And thus I concur with Poppyl.

If I follow the thread correctly, it seems we are trying to find a way for PRR to get to Birkett Mills (possibly via the trolley). where they could have exchanged cars for local traffic with NYC, because of a recollection that NYC and PRR exchanged cars through some industry trackage/sidings. (I personally can't figure out the trolley option since Basin St would bring the trolley to one side of Birkett Mills, and the NYC was down below on the other side.)

Do we have any other confirming evidence that PRR actually served Birkett Mills, like billing records or carloading records?
Is there any other possible industry where they might have exchanged somehow, perhaps via the trolley. Did NYC connect to the trolley anywhere????
JS

pumpers wrote:If I follow the thread correctly, it seems we are trying to find a way for PRR to get to Birkett Mills (possibly via the trolley). where they could have exchanged cars for local traffic with NYC, because of a recollection that NYC and PRR exchanged cars through some industry trackage/sidings. (I personally can't figure out the trolley option since Basin St would bring the trolley to one side of Birkett Mills, and the NYC was down below on the other side.)

I only noted that that would be the only possibility for a crossover, and a very slim possibility at that. It would require some changes to the terrain that I don't believe ever happened, as it would be highly unlikely that they would be reverted to the manner we find things now.

Do we have any other confirming evidence that PRR actually served Birkett Mills, like billing records or carloading records?
Is there any other possible industry where they might have exchanged somehow, perhaps via the trolley. Did NYC connect to the trolley anywhere????
JS

Those are the right questions ... for which I don't have answers,

I don't know if this will shed any light on the topic but I found the timing to be a little ironic. A weekly paper in the PY area runs a column labeled "From the Files". This week's edition references a news story from July 9, 1885 in which "it is stated that the Northern Central Railroad is considering the feasibility of constructing a track from the depot in Penn Yan to the steamboat landing on Lake Keuka. The number of switches connected with the Penn Yan and Dresden road indicates that a great amount of freight is to pass over the new line."

Perhaps some more food for thought.

Poppyl

On another post, someone refers to a 'roundhouse fire' circa 1910. Was there ever a roundhouse in Penn Yan or a turntable? Where located?

Perhaps poppyl remembers. But, I digress.

Three staller barn and turntable were just east of the Northern Central/PRR bridge over the outlet.

K4Pacific wrote:Perhaps poppyl remembers. But, I digress.

Three staller barn and turntable were just east of the Northern Central/PRR bridge over the outlet.

I may be old, but not that old to remember something that long ago.

K4, you are, as usual, a wealth of historical information. I figured that there must have been a turntable somewhere in PY since the locos certainly weren't going to back all the way down to Dresden. As to the existence of a "roundhouse", I think that engine shed would be the more accurate description, particularly given the tight quarters where you placed the turntable. I've seen the area that you mentioned and it looks really tight for anything but the shortest of turntables unless the table was part of the main leading westward to the mill and docks. That's why I speculated that it may have been located closer to the lake docks, perhaps in the area of the old PY Boats or Comstock Foods, where there was more real estate to work with.

Next time that I'm in PY I'll wander down there and see if any remains are left.

Poppyl

A bridge with track still on it in downtown Penn Yan:
http://photos.greatrails.net/s/?p=186404

Some rail still in place near the Liberty Street bridge:
http://photos.greatrails.net/s/?p=186405

I remember a PC GP 38 on there just before the 72 Flood.

Did you go for a trip down the rail-trail? There's lots of interesting stuff to see.

thebigham wrote:A bridge with track still on it in downtown Penn Yan:
http://photos.greatrails.net/s/?p=186404

Some rail still in place near the Liberty Street bridge:
http://photos.greatrails.net/s/?p=186405

I finally discovered that the bridge in your first photo served several industries on the north side of the Keuka Outlet, including the building that I used to think was a railroad station. It was actually built by the Penn Yan Glass Light Co. I guess that many commodities were sold off of this spur, including lumber, pipe and fruit at one time.

Some great information at this links...

http://www.crookedlakereview.com/articl ... dumas.html

"During the 1880s several new structures were built between the Outlet and Water Street, including a large brick warehouse on the site of the old tannery, and Conkling & Ellsworth's coal and wood yard behind it. Both buildings were on land owned by local entrepreneur John Conklin, who sold—among other things—coal, wood, masons' supplies, sewer pipe, agricultural implements, fruits, beans, potatoes and fertilizers.

John Conklin & Sons went into bankruptcy in 1916. Much of the property had by then been sold off, part of it to the fledgling Penn Yan Gas Light Co., which in 1899 built a small Normanesque stone castle on the site of the old malthouse (that structure having burned in 1894). Another parcel went to Wolcott Cole, who soon after the turn of the century built a brick bean house on the Outlet's bank."

http://hahn.zenfolio.com/abandoned_home ... #h1e76caf1

A photo of the old gas light property.

- BWP

The connection between the PRR and NYC at Penn Yan, N.Y. isn't in the 1945 PRR CT-1000, list of Stations & Sidings at
http://www.multimodalways.org/docs/rail ... 1-1945.pdf

All of these are code 8322:
Penn Van, N. Y. (Station and Public De-
livery) 119.8
•• (Freight Station and Siding) 119.8
•• (Geo. W. Haxton & Son No. 2)t 119.9
•• (Finger Lakes Cider & Vinegar Co.Jt 119.9
•• (Fiero & Monnin)t 119.9
8322 .. (G. L. F. Farm Products, Inc. and
Vineyardist, Inc.Jt 120.0
•• (Clinton Produce Co., Shay Oil Co., Kinkaid Produce Co. and Barden
& Robeson Corp. No. l)t 120.2
•• (J. D. Moore Coal Co.Jt ...•..••.•........ 120.3
•• (Barden & Robeson Corp. No. 2)t .. 120.4

"t" is really a Dagger, meaning "For Individual Use".

Since the footnote for "Plant Connection with Erie R.R. appears at 2 of the Salt Companies at Watkins, where the Erie must have had trackage rights, the absence of a similar note in Penn Yan must mean no connection on May 1, 1945. The previous edition was Nov. 1, 1923.

The Canandaugua Lake branch to Lake Landing does show in this list.