What if NYC Lines, LLC was spun off by CSX?

Just did an exhaustive Google Image search...I can not BELIEVE that those cars never made it onto railfan collections.

I saw about five coil cars so painted...in 2001 or early 2002, on the line-of-road between Cleveland and Buffalo. I watched for more...but none appeared; and I figured that these were some sort of "mistake" and had gotten repainted.

About a year ago in Collinwood Yard, I saw one more coil car with (one of two covers) painted NYC. That was the last sighting...man, I wish now I'd had a camera.

Any chance that CSX would sell some of its customers in the NYC area? For instance, they switch out Marval in Mamaroneck, NY, their only customer on the NH line. What about the freight operations around the old Harlem Yard and Oak Point Yards? There can't be that much business for them on the Hudson line, either. Is Oak Point / Harlem that lucrative? What about north of Poughkeepsie?

Sarge wrote:Any chance that CSX would sell some of its customers in the NYC area? For instance, they switch out Marval in Mamaroneck, NY, their only customer on the NH line. What about the freight operations around the old Harlem Yard and Oak Point Yards? There can't be that much business for them on the Hudson line, either. Is Oak Point / Harlem that lucrative? What about north of Poughkeepsie?

There is enough business in New York to run a decent size train each way
on a more or less daily basis. There is also a possibility of an increase in
trash business on this run too.
On the other hand, they do not pay too much to use Metro-North trackage
to reach New York.
As for the remaining business on the New Haven Line, there is still some
business between New Haven and Bridgeport as well as the lumber yard
at Darien and a customer in Mamaroneck.
I have my doubts if you will see any major changes in this operation
anytime soon but again with CSX, you never know for sure.
Noel Weaver

Thanks Noel. I figured the business from the Bronx/Hunts and Oak Points was fairly significant, but didn't know to what extent. I figured the New Haven Line business was small, though, and they might sell the customers off to P&W.

They're still out there - I see them on a somewhat regular basis mixed in the unit coil trains that go up the Toledo Sub to/from Detroit. As for 'why' they have "NYC" on the coil covers - since they are seperable from the cars - they have to have something on them to denote ownership, and following the conventions that results in the cars themselves having NYC reporting marks - you end up with "NYC" lettering on the covers. No conspiracy, no scuttled effort to divest of the "NYC LLC" properties - just the need to mark ownership of the hoods....

I'd be surprised that any new repaints of former Conrail cars are receiving the NYC markings, but I haven't seen any fresh re-paints in a while (except for the 2929 cu ft. covered hoppers that have been converted to ore cars) to say one way or the other.

conrail_engineer wrote:

LCJ wrote:

A few cars were actually painted/lettered (big lettering) NYC instead of CSX, using CSX blue and yellow paint.

Ah, another conspiracy...

Changing reporting marks is easier than changing/consolidating car numbers/series. I'm convinced that's all there is to that scenario, no matter what color the paint was.

Respectfully, no.

Reporting marks are one thing. "NYC" reporting marks are out there and will remain, for many very good reasons (not the least of which is the cost/effort of renumbering a fleet of freight cars).

What I'm referring to, is - the cars in question were steel coil cars - the cars painted CSX blue, but instead of the traditional block-serif "CSX" on the sides, the cars had (four-foot-high block typeface but san-serif) "NYC."

This on the coil-covers, NOT on the bodies of the cars.

Now, a lot of cars have been painted in eight years. Many of the Conrail coal hoppers have been repainted in CSX colors, identical to the rest but for the NYC reporting marks. These cars have been stenciled "CSX" - only those few coil cars were graced with "NYC" stenciling.

Point I'm making is, it's hard to chalk up a SERIES of cars' paint jobs in four-foot-high markings, to a mistake or miscue or anything other than an instruction...perhaps one that went out prematurely.

And it's hard to make a "conspiracy" out of it - since it IS their property.

(Edit to clarify)

Sarge wrote:Thanks Noel. I figured the business from the Bronx/Hunts and Oak Points was fairly significant, but didn't know to what extent. I figured the New Haven Line business was small, though, and they might sell the customers off to P&W.

i think this will all eventually go to p&w, but csx will maintain traffic rights for the through trains. the garbage is big business, and the line haul on the regular freight is still significant. no rumor or crystal ball, just the general direction of how p&w has expaded their services and market before. the bigger railroads want out of the terminal business; could be the same for eastern mass.