Rondout tower Last call

Word has come around that Roundout tower will close on Saturday and operations will be cut over to the CP C&M dispatcher. RIP CP Roundout.

Unless I'm mistaken this will make UD Tower in Joliet the last operational tower in the Chicagoland area.

JLJ061 wrote:Unless I'm mistaken this will make UD Tower in Joliet the last operational tower in the Chicagoland area.

A-2? Pretty sure that's still locally staffed.

And don't forget JB Tower on the CN (ex EJ&E) in West Chicago...

Also don't forget Lake Street tower at Ogilvie, as well as 16th Street and Blue Island on the Rock.

A-5 and B-17 are still open, yes?

Rondout is where I worked on a section gang. I remember washing up in the first floor area and the well water smelled like chicken fat! And after work we spent time at the Sports Mans Clug across the J tracks drinking PBR's!

TNT

Tom Tancula wrote:A-5 and B-17 are still open, yes?

A Metra engineer told me last week that the next (and I think final) phase of the signal cutovers at A-5 were to occur last weekend. That would be replacing the east entrance and exit signals with new entrance and no exit signals. A-5 has already been subdivided into A-5, A-6, and B-6. A-5 is now just the west and north line junction along with the crossovers at the east end and the now stub spur in the south east quadrant (used to lead to the Bloomingdale Branch but it's gone now). A-6 is the crossovers on the west end of the the north line plus the north east quadrant stub spur and the north west quadrant connector to the west line. B-6 is the crossovers on the west end of the west line plus its end of the northwest quadrant connector to the north line. Westbound exit signals at the west ends went away when A-6 and B-6 were created. No idea if this is controlled from the old A-5 tower or cutover to a new location but I believe the plan is for it to be controlled from the Metra control center.

Drove past Rondout tower tonight and I saw a light on in an un-boarded up window. Not sure whats going on if it's unnamed?

Most likely a signal maintainer at work, there might be "maintainer boards" where the old controls were.
"Maintainer boards" allow for local control of remote controlled interlockings in case of emergency or network failure.