The Last Hot Spot - Folkston

I haven't seen every railfanning hot spot in the country, but I've seen a lot of them.  Nowadays new ones are popping up all the time thanks to the internet and the economic impact of railfan parks.  'Back in the day' parks and platforms were unheard of and now they are all over.  Railroads and law enforcement are a lot touchier about trespassing than they used to be so having a place to sit and not be pestered just makes railfanning easy.

My personal list of railfan parks and places to visit started shrinking fast in the last few years.  I grew up with Sherman Hill and the Moffat Tunnel within easy reach so most western sights were already checked off.  A pair of trips to Altoona in 2002 probably kicked off the list reduction in fine form.  There I took advantage of Gallitzin Park, Cassandra Overlook, Cresson Platform and of course Horseshoe Curve Park.  It was just a lot more fun when you didn't have to watch the signs or look over your shoulder.  Later on other trips I checked out more park settings like Deshler, OH, Rochelle RR Park, and Kansas City Riverwalk.  A H.A.P.T. adventure to Sand Patch filled in some great spots on the old B&O.  Another H.A.P.T. trip to California in 2009 hit spots like Fullerton, Roseville, Cajon Pass, Tehachapi Loop,  Keddie Wye, and a small park at Portola.  Last year though really cleaned house.  Charles Kadyk and I hit Marion, Bellevue, Fostoria, Homewood, Rochelle, Galesburg, found more in Burlington, Keokuk and Fort Madison, IA.  We found perches throughout Nebraska including Grand Island and North Platte.  We even found a new park in Pacific, MO and a very hospitable town with street running in LaGrange, KY.  The final crowns were The Elkorn Inn in WV on the old N&W and a stop by the Virginia Transportation Museum in Roanoke. 

There simply weren't many other big name places on my personal list, except for Folkston.  Sure I'd go back to any of those on my list but this was the only personal 'biggie' left.  I'll continue to fill in new places but I feel like I've reached some sort of completion level thanks to a road trip to Florida.  It didn't hurt that I hit my 48th of the contiguous states a few miles down the road when I continued on to Florida.

The park at Folkston is suitably located south of a junction which 'funnels' nearly all north-south traffic destined for Florida by the platform.   The platform is located on the east side of the tracks and is a good viewing point for most of the day.  The intense sun began to drive me out around 6pm.    Humidity was the only real annoyance.  Ceiling fans really made a difference with the abundant shade at the platform.  Trains were abundant too.  A scanner provided a good deal of info and a track chart was posted.  You can see from the photos that the platform itself is pretty well situated and well furnished.  They even have a permanent rest room building. 

On my visit, I saw plenty of trains.  It was a Dash 8 haven mostly.  But, I saw other oddities like the GP30 slug and a rebuilt SD40-3.  The Tropicana train and Amtrak get through here too, but I didn't see them in my 6 hour stay.  The heat slowed my activity so I didn't have the drive to visit the museum across the tracks.  They had a small covered picnic table and a long porch but it was too sunny while I was there.  They would have been good perches if I'd stayed overnight.  A local fan group apparently is working on the caboose as a clubhouse.  Some guys with clipboards were chatting with them just before I left.  Might have been a permitting process tour of some kind. 

I really enjoyed the visit.  There were various local visitors and railfans from the region to chat with from time to time.  Some cloud cover made movement tolerable and those glorious ceiling fans really made the visit comfortable.  Even though I'm not much of a CSX fan, the number of trains and the SCL heritage overwhelmed that bias. 

 BC

North Platte or Bust: Part 11, La Grange, KY

August 16

We deliberately stopped a bit north of Louisville in a smallish town called La Grange.  The fact that they have street trackage, and practically celebrate it, drew our attention.  It turned out to be a terrific town to spend a few hours in.  It was nearly the only railfanning we did on a "travel day".

The old L&N depot on the west end of town was the future home of some local railfan's visitor center.  We found the very European looking steamer sitting out front.

From the end of town we drove back down into the street trackage area.  A stretch of track running about two city blocks through a busy and vibrant downtown area.  There was room for curbside parking on both sides and two lanes of traffic.  However, trains pretty much used one lane when they passed.


We located a good place to sit on the east end.  There were benches on the street corners so we picked the one with the best camera angles and lighting.  These happened to be metal rockers.   I had to get Charles to pose for a shot to show the street, the rockers and our vantage point.  We call these L.A.R.F.'ing chairs.
(Lazy A-- Rail Fanning)  This time they were provided by the city of La Grange and not pulled from the car's trunk.



The city spent a lot of energy keeping the town clean and maintained.  The streets were swept.  Flowers were growing everywhere.  Businesses seemed to be doing well.  Rather than fight the trains (CSX puts up to 30 per day through town) they celebrate it.  The city logo and slogans referred to the trains.




Amazingly, when a train came along, chaos did not develop.  Locals knew the drill well.   The business people we chatted with seemed to expect train nuts to visit and they were friendly people anyway.





Once we caught a couple of northbounds we moved to the other end of the street trackage.  Here we were next to a courthouse square and more businesses.  While we were basking in the shade of the courthouse park, a local reporter came by and asked if we were from the media (Charles' camera looks like a reporter's).  We had stumbled into another sensational murder trial (locally big this time).  We looked around and saw the people in a new light.  Lots of media types, security types and lawyer types.  I crossed the street for the next train.

We ate lunch outdoors at the One Nineteen Restaurant.  They had sidewalk tables that kept us about ten feet from the tracks.  Before, during and after we saw about 3 trains from that spot.  The staff was tickled to have a couple of rail enthusiasts around.  They were as excited about the trains as we were.  Of course, they had a business that was also across from the courthouse.  The food was good and our perky waitress kept my iced tea full.  We could see the end of the street trackage from out seats.


The light had shifted in the four hours we were around.  We decided it was time to leave.  However, there was a set of signals on the north end of the street zone that told us that a train was out there.  Red told us it was a southbound and probably at the siding north of the depot.  We headed to our original perch by the "LARFing chairs".   This gave me a chance to try some more wide angle shots.




Thinking this was it for a while, we looked at the signals again to confirm.  Still lit.  Something else was around.  We had gotten the idea from someone earlier that a local we'd seen would return south.  Sure enough, it appeared fairly soon.  This time the GP30 slug was leading.

We could leave now that we saw it.










I don't recall where Eminence fit in on the map but it was an important stop on the L&N once.  The line is gone now but was cut back to here in recent times.  Apparently bourbon was one of the chief products of the town and today Eminence Speakers are produced there.  The depot was unique enough to photograph.  It turned out to be the last significant rail shot of the day.  We were traveling to our last night's stop at the Elkhorn Inn in Landgraff, West Virginia.

We were headed into the hills.  No more straight and level roads for a while.  We had to go past Frankfort and Lexington to get into the serious mountains, but it was already getting rugged outside of La Grange.  We'd see it all by the time we found the Elkhorn Inn.  It wasn't exactly off an Interstate highway on the prarie.

BC

North Platte or Bust: Part 10, Goodbye Mid-West

Pacific, MO

WEDNESDAY AUGUST 15, 2012:

We arose to one of the best accidental findings of the trip:  Pacific, Missouri
Pacific is a railfan hotspot, complete with park and visitor center that we barely knew existed - but should have.  The Trains "Hot Spots Guidebook" listed Eureka, the next town east.  Close.
The Route 66 Railfan Visitor Center is hosted by some great railfans who were as helpful as could be. The town also had some railroad and Civil War history to check out.  We were sitting near the point where the Missouri Pacific was vying for first transcontinental status and the Frisco was born.  That same history made it a target in the Civil War.  The two roads in town were one once and Frisco split from a branch that originated here.

Pacific, MO

Route 66 Railfan Visitors Center

And, we found it all by chance.  We asked Expedia for a motel in Eureka, but it found a better one in Pacific.  We may not have found it otherwise except that we thought we might as well see what this town had for trains, since we were here already.  So many ways we could have missed it all...

Back at the motel, we heard scanner chatter almost as soon as we turned the radio on.  We reconnoitered the area and headed to Hardee's for breakfast since it was handy.   Charles spotted the visitor's center on the first pass through town and I couldn't miss the covered

Returning local.  Pacific, MO

picnic tables next to the tracks.  We returned after eating and parked in the public parking between the old Frisco and MoPac lines.  Our first stop was the visitors center.  I thought it was just a well located hobby shop.  Charles went in first and didn't come out.  Curiosity led me in fairly soon after I determined that a train wasn't nearby. 

BNSF GE's Pacific, MO

The folks at the center were busy with organizing a fundraiser or something but they were exceedingly helpful with railfan information about the entire St. Louis area.  A computer provided ATCS information for both lines.  I'm not one for crowds so I walked over to the shelter to wait on a BNSF train I thought would appear from the west.  Charles stayed inside and got to know people.  I also had a vague idea that an Amtrak "Missouri River" train from KC was around.

Pacific, MO

  The BNSF did come along, but far later than I expected and the Amtrak totally surprised me.  I like the "old and new" paint schemes on the BNSF GE's.  The fact that I managed to line up the Civil War Monument with the passing of a relatively speedy Amtrak train is mostly luck.  It looks stopped, but wasn't.  A returning local on the UP side gave a chance to try some new angles.  This may have been the first train we heard earlier.

Unfortunately, without prior knowledge of this place, we didn't allow ourselves much time to stick around.  It seemed like a waste of good info to move on.  However, we both vowed to return with a vengeance.  The  St. Louis area has so much to offer railfans and the visitor center can help take the mystery out of such an adventure.

Ex-C&EI/L&N Nashville, IL

Nashville, IL

Down the road and over in Illinois again, we were tracking eastward over side roads again.  We crossed many lines that existed or had been pulled up.  At one point we stabilized on a route parallel with the Evansville Western Railway.  We pretty much followed it over most of its route, but saw no trains anywhere.  We investigated many of its interchanges too.  Nothing.  However, the chase did get us into a couple of other sights that we might have missed otherwise.

National Railway Equipment

National Railway Equipment, Mt. Vernon, IL

Mt. Vernon, Illinois is the known home of National Railway Equipment.  However, when we stumbled into it, I couldn't have told you that.  I never made the connection until I saw the signs.  Never have I seen such a collection of old relics.  There were FM's, BLW's, MLW's, ALCO's and GE's mixed in the stuff laying around.  Some of them had to be from the 1940's.  We were following a string of diamonds and interchanges on "short range sensors" when I spotted this final shot below.  That led us around the block to see what else was about.  Very cool but the place seemed hostile with plenty of no trespassing signs and fencing. 

National Railway Equipment, Mt. Vernon, IL

We continued east, checking out the various rail lines we encountered but didn't find anything significant for the rest of the day.  The last major railfan stop was Bluford (south of Centralia) where the old Southern crossed over the old IC.  Interesting but little access, bad light and not trains so no photos.  We were headed to La Grange, KY so we had some miles ahead of us.  Nearby I-64 got us started toward Louisville.  Interestingly, we passed the Indiana coal fields and even the massive pit where Peabody Coal came from.  The SPV atlas showed enough convincing detail to confirm it.  Too bad there weren't some of those Peabody yellow unit trains kicking around anymore...

BC

North Platte or Bust: Part 8, North Platte

Bailey Yard, North Platte, NE

MONDAY AUG. 13, 2012

O'Fallons, NE

We spent the night in North Platte but our first mission on this

O'Fallons, NE

Monday morning was to go touch the Mountain Time Zone a few miles to the west.  This had nothing to do with railfanning but took us past O'Fallons where the Powder River traffic joins the main line.  This is essentially the other end of the 3 track main.

O'Fallons, NE

O'Fallons, NE

On the way back we encountered a train sitting on the
embankment of a relatively new flyover track.  As we got out to photograph it, it began to move.
This was not far west of the actual wye at O'Fallons.



Once the train was by we headed for Bailey Yard and the Golden Spike Tower in North Platte.  This was the reason we headed into Nebraska in the first place.  It was worth the effort.  There is a nice museum at the foot of the tower and an elevator takes you to two observation decks - one open and one enclosed.  From there you can see Bailey Yard, the largest rail yard in the world.  There are some incredible statistics on the yard which I'll spare you here.  Suffice it to say, the view was awesome.

Bailey Yard, North Platte, NE

Bailey Yard, North Platte, NE

Bailey Yard, North Platte, NE

Bailey Yard, North Platte, NE

CSX Power

Slugs!

Bailey Yard, North Platte, NE

Bailey Yard, North Platte, NE

Bailey Yard, North Platte, NE

Bailey Yard, North Platte, NE

Challenger

Eventually it was time to leave Bailey

Centennial

Yard.  We moved across town to Cody Park where historical equipment was on display.  There was a Challenger and a Centennial to look over.  It was a small but excellent collection.  I liked the unique UP flavor of it.

Cody Park, North Platte, NE

Cody Park, North Platte, NE

RPO Car

Cody Park, North Platte, NE

Cody Park, North Platte, NE

Cody Park, North Platte, NE

Three track mainline.  Brady, NE

When we finished here we grabbed some lunch and headed to the

Brady, NE - new pedestrian overpass

overpass at Brady, just east of town.  Here we could look down on the 3 track main.  It turned out to be fairly busy too so my lunch was nearly cold when I got back to it.

Brady, NE - new pedestrian overpass

Brady, NE - new pedestrian overpass

Brady, NE - new pedestrian overpass

The overpass was pretty good except for the chain link fence.  When we arrived a local guy drove his riding mower over the whole ramp system, so you could tell it was fairly wide.  Kids drove their bikes by us.  Not a bad photo advantage for such empty land. 

Ravenna, NE

Ravenna, NE

We were going to detour from US 30 to visit the BNSF Powder River line at Ravenna on the way back.  This spot is a crew change point and features an office and extensive employee housing.  I'd had great luck at this spot in the past, but not today.  One wb train was sitting at the office and soon an eb stopped on the edge of town.  But, that was it.  We had a long way to go yet that day so we moved on.  We stood on a new highway bridge, but the chain link was not friendly to cameras.

Ravenna, NE

I took what shots I could of our one train before it left.  This can be a hopping place.  It just wasn't at this moment while we were here.  We followed the line back to Grand Island and didn't really encounter much that we could photograph.  We did see a couple of trains held up at the single track UP overpass.  No noise on the scanner didn't help.  We decided to move on.  Time to head south for a while.

Hastings, NE

Hastings was our next stop.  This is on the CB&Q Denver line out of Lincoln.  It has a reasonable amount of traffic and sees the Zephyr in the late at night and the wee hours of the morning.  Across the street from the depot is this building proclaiming that Hastings is the birthplace of Kool-Aid.  East of town was an extensive military ordinance storage facility that once had a web of track.  Some of the bunkers now had trees on them.




We were headed for Manhattan, KS by way of Marysville, KS but our light was failing faster than we were making progress.  We hit the grid of side roads to find the UP.  "Short range sensors" kept showing tracks that were long gone.  We headed for the town of Ong.  The BN must have pulled the tracks and left the town to dry up and blow away.  It looked abandoned but was not.

 Davenport, NE (just south of Ong)

Farther south we found the town of Davenport.  Here is where we sat at a crossing and waited for the Marysville Sub to come to life.  A local farmer stopped and asked if something was coming (common question along the UP). 

 Davenport, NE (just south of Ong)

We had a friendly chat before it was time for him to go on.  Eventually our wait was rewarded.





Our adventure did not end at Davenport, even though our cameras were finished for the day.  We did get into the towns of Fairbury and Marysville where the scanner came to life.  We were to make it to my friend Jim's place in Manhattan for the night so after Marysville it was time to call.  We passed a lot of granger trackage that "short range sensors" showed but nothing was left.  Out here the missing tracks were CB&Q, MoPac, Rock and UP.  We also passed sections of Kansas' only narrow gauge, but I couldn't spot them.


In the morning we would be chasing UP 844 with Jim's guidance.

BC

Marysville Sub, Davenport, NE (just south of Ong)