Pictures of NYS&W in Edgewater

Can anyone point me to a good resource for photos of the old NYS&W facilities in Edgewater (and on that end of the Edgewater tunnel in general?) I have recently gotten the NYSW books by Edward Kaminski and John Krause/Ed Crist. There are a few pics in those, but I am looking for more sort of panoramic photos that show more of an overall view of operations as opposed to the type of closer-up photos of individual pieces of equipment that tend to be in these books. I scanned the attached photo out of the Krause/Crist book, and this is the kind of thing I'd really like to see, especially the Seatrain operation and any of the other industries in the area.

Thanks very much in advance.

This is a bit of a late response, but I'm very new here...
http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/locThu ... x?id=91224" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
And here is the archive of the Blue Comet website, which has a bunch of good photos (not all of them work though..):
http://web.archive.org/web/201204150602 ... comet.com/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
Hope this helps!

Wow, those are spectacular. Was really looking for pictures of the "austerity years", and there are certainly plenty of those. Thanks very much for the links.

You're welcome!
Do you know why they closed it?
It seemed to be doing good business up until it shut...

Why did they close Edgewater? They progressively lost more and more of the biggest customers over there, starting with (I think) the big Ford plant which moved to Mahwah, then SeaTrain closed down (SeaTrain may have closed first). By the time the Susie Q stopped using the Edgewater tunnel they were really only using the tracks through the tunnel and into Edgewater for car storage, I believe.

The tunnel still exists, but the track has been pulled up all the way back to just west of Tonnelle Ave. The tunnel is used now for various utilities - pipes, cables/wires etc.

Thanks!

Ford moved out of Edgewater in the mid-1950's. It was part of the reason that Henry Norton was forced out as President of the NYS&W. Sea-Train moved out around 1973. For a brief time Sea-Train moved back to their original location on the Hoboken Shore Railroad, but they failed by the mid 1970's.

The last major customer that the NYS&W served in Edgewater was Lever Brothers. When the real estate became desirable for luxury apartments, condos and shopping centers, the industry left.

There was a brief period in the late 1980's when there was some talk of using the NYS&W tunnel instead of the West Shore tunnel for the Hudson-Bergen Light Rail. The proposal was to have the line end at the Park-n-Ride lot at the Vince Lombardi Rest Area on the NJ Turnpike. Seeing how much traffic and congestion has come to River Road, had the HBLRT followed the NYC/NYS&W ROW one could image the trains being well used - unlike the current Tonelle Ave terminus.

Tim,

I worked on that proposal for re-use of the Edgewater tunnel for the light rail system in 1993-1995 time frame while I worked for Bergen County. Unfortunately the politicians had their idea that the HBLR had to go through the Weehawken Tunnel and the "Bergen" part of HBLR was not going to happen.

I remember seeing a tank car and a covered hopper at two industries in Edgewater around 1993. That was pretty much the end. There was over a foot of standing water at the east portal of the tunnel, and well over to top of the rails. I also believe the ceiling clearances could only handle plate B cars; I wasn't even sure a plate c box car could make it through.

Developers were buying up the remaining industrial property even at that time.

I believe the town of Edgewater was originally against the plan to have the light rail come through. Once the tide had changed, it was already too late and the current routing was well underway. They must be kicking themselves. I've also long said that it should just be HLR, since it has not come, nor is it that much closer to coming to Bergen.

I was working in Weehawken until only just recently, and I have to say, the Tonnelle Ave. trains got their use. Every evening as I was going home, I'd see train after train heading up to Tonnelle Ave coming out of my stop (Lincoln Harbor) heading up to Tonnelle. Maybe most of them got off at Port Imperial, I suppose, but you can get the ferry from 14th Street Hoboken and Lincoln Harbor too, so not everyone was riding up that way to get the ferry out of Port Imperial.

This isn't to say that the route you suggest (to the Lombardi Park & Ride) wouldn't have been better, but it's not like the trains are deserted.

I'd still like to see the HBLRT lines to Englewood come to reality (and maybe even the one proposed on the NYS&W), but those seem like a pipe dream with the way this state is run.