Spur off TT across Douglas

An old topo map indicates a short spur off of the TT line at what used to be the southern end of Douglas Rd. (Up until 1981, Douglas reduced to 4 lanes just south of Kenwood Blvd., and abruptly ended with a solid right turn on to University Hills Blvd.)

The spur looks like it just about paralleled the curve of University Hills Blvd., and appears to have been on the property of what is now an apartment complex. According to Steam Powered Video's Railroad Atlas, the spur was called "Wright Siding".

What did this spur serve, and did it ever have a grade crossing of Douglas Rd.? Note that the 1950s topo map showed that even that section of Douglas was not yet built.

http://terraserver.microsoft.com/image. ... %7cohio%7c

Well I lived here for 5 years and never saw anything rail related on that side of Douglas, but I found the siding you are referring to on a 1980 Topo Map. I'm surprised.

I believe there had been apartments on this site far before 1980 (they had become very ragged by the late 1990's, and most members of the nearby Old Orchard neighborhood, can recall a major fire that took place here around 1996, or so, that led to the eventual selling and total refurbishing of what became the new University Hills Apartments. I personally will never forget the summer day I went out into my backyard to find it snowing. Upon closer look it was ash falling from the fire over a mile away.)

I think we'll need some assistance from one of our Toledo "Lifers" who have been here for awhile to solve this one.

The University Hills Apartments were built around 1969. Before that, the property was a kind of market garden
with several farmhouses, greenhouses and related outbuildings. This property extended all the way from behind
the houses on the east side of Cheltenham Road to present day Douglas Road.

Wright Siding is named after the Wrights, who owned this parcel of property. In 1930, it was known as
Wright Brothers Greenhouse Company with the address listed as 2914 W. Bancroft. I suspect the spur was built
to serve this large operation.



View looking northeast. Goddard Street is in the foreground

Drew, you don't visit us nearly enough. Those are great photos, thanks.

matt wrote:Drew, you don't visit us nearly enough. Those are great photos, thanks.

Matt, you might like these too.

Here are a couple of old maps showing the Wright property in relation to Old Orchard and Toledo Terminal. The first
one is from 1929 and the second one is 1921. Looks like Wright Siding went directly up to one of the greenhouses.





The files are quite large. Let me know if they are too big and I'll hotlink the downsized maps instead with a URL for the large ones.

Drew

Hey Drew, those are some great pictures! You know those two houses in the foreground on Goddard Rd.? My closest friend lived in the one on the left. Looks like there was a detached 3-car garage in the back even then. Amazing!

When I lived in Old Orchard in the 70s, the area between Pelham Rd. and the apartments was just an open field overgrown with tall grass. I remember there being a lot of concern when subsidized housing was built on that spot, but I heard that they didn't turn out to be the problem folks expected them to be.

Were the Sanborne maps from your personal collection, a library or some online source? The only time I've ever been in Toledo area was on the Lake Shore Ltd (on or ahead of schedule) but I've become fasinated by the rail history of the area from what I've read on the boards.