P.C.C.M. #66 Part 2 - Outbound To Selkirk

Greetings followers of the Atlantic Pacific Railroad and the Penn Central Car Movements!

P.C.C.M. #66 continues on the A.P.R.R. as the outbound cars have been brought to Rock Ridge Yard for departure to Selkirk. At Selkirk, the cars will be classified for their final destinations and delivered by the Penn Central.

Some history of the Selkirk Yard, courtesy of Wikipedia:

Selkirk Yard was built in 1924 by the New York Central Railroad on a 700-acre (280-hectare) site. Initially it had two hump classification yards with a capacity of 11,000 cars, and typically handled 8,000 cars per day. The facility was rebuilt in 1968 as Alfred E. Perlman Yard on an expanded site of 1,250 acres (510 ha). It features a 70-track classification hump yard, several support yards and servicing facilities. The yard can process over 3,200 cars per day using computerized controls that originally employed a GE PAC 4020. Here's how Selkirk looked. Image courtesy Trains Magazine and the NY Central circa 1924 (approximately).

Today's Rock Ridge Yard work is posted. Engineer of the day is 1/87th Steve and he requested 1/87th Stuart. I guess he wants to give Stuart the full experience hauling him to Selkirk for the overnight adventure. Any crew member assigned to Steve will know the ride is an adventure! 

The yard crew gets some instructions from 1/87th NJ John and they're off to build the train.

Meanwhile, the AP #200 yard crew pulls the Auto Box cars that were set off last night and positions them on the west side of the classification yard tracks.

Meanwhile, AP #201 is hard at work blocking the box cars for the N.Y.C.T.L.They will add the 50' box cars to the engines and then add the auto box cars. The will prevent any 'string lining' of the long box cars behind engines. It's a practice that many railroads employ to prevent derailments.

Next up, the PS-2 covered hoppers....

They add the cars for the KP&W to the end of the freight train.

AP #300 and PC #7783 will now back into the train, couple up, do an air brake test, then head out. Final orders from the tower operator are given to the crew.

Air Brake test completed and they get clearance from CP South tower to proceed to the departure track of Rock Ridge Yard...

A stop signal has them on the east end of Little Jamaica tower, awaiting the signal to head out...

That concludes the outbound portion of P.C.C.M. #66 on the A.P.R.R.

Stop by the weekend of November 16th for the inbound portion of this P.C.C.M.

Don't forget to check out the other P.C.C.M. layout participants!

Sir John's N.Y.C.T.L.

PC Ralph's K.P. & W.

Brian's R.C.R.

Thanks for reading!

P.C.C.M. #66 Part 1 - Outbound Freight For Departure

Greetings followers of the Atlantic Pacific Railroad and my blog. We're getting ready to start another Penn Central Car Movement, in a series that started with just two layouts - Sir John's The New York Central Train Layout and PC Ralph's The Kings Port Division HO Scale Model Railroad. It has grown to participation with my railroad and Brian's Ralston Creek Railroad.

Today we're going to start off with P.C.C.M. #66 and it will be a 3 layout move! As many of you may have read, I was on vacation, so the N.Y.C.T.L. created a 'story' on why the A.P.R.R. could not participate. Train Line Closed from Weehawken to Rock Ridge. Of course Ralph's Railroad helped out with Clean Up On The River Line. We finished it with the Train Delrailment Clean Up. Now on to P.C.C.M. #66!

Here's today's assignment for the crew in Rock Ridge Yard. Multiple pick up locations as freight has been waiting to head out!

The first move of the day is taking place at the R.M.O. Electric Power Plant. Since the closing of the line, the surplus coal was being used and now they're needing more. AP #900 GE 44 Tonner will pull out two empty hopper cars destined for KP Steel for more coal. 1/87th Ken is operating the engine. It's a short move since the engine only works the tracks within the industry and approximately 100 years outside on the Rock Ridge Secondary. He'll drop the empties and AP #200 RS-1 with 1/87th Bob in the cab with his brakeman 1/87th Stuart on the line for a number of moves. They'll head out as RM-1...

They bring the empties to the yard and store them on the east ladder track #4.

Next up is AP #201 RS-1, the sister engine to #200.  Engineer of the day on #201 is 1/87th Steve, along with his brakeman 1/87th Bill. Both are veteran railroad guys, so they're shouldn't be any issues picking up the freight cars in the Rock Ridge area. They're assigned RR-2 and will make pick ups at Freihofers, Shapeless Steel, C&P Restaurant Supply and Mike's Lumber.

Three cars will be pulled from Freihofers. The LV Box Car us supposed to head to West Mill Empty. However, Sir 1/87th Neal has made arrangements with Freihofers management to put a pallet of those Freihofers Chocolate Chip Cookies to the management of the KP&W for their help with the derailment on the PC line. The same thing will apply with the HRC car as it will have an extra pallet of cookies for the N.Y.C.T.L. crew who hauled away some of the wreckage on the line. That car as well as the PC car are headed to Ralph's Grocery with Freihofers baked cookies and cakes. They should be able to smell that car coming their way!!

Next stop is to Shapeless Steel as they've loaded some sheets of steel, which will be used at Acme Auto Parts. The original load was going to be coils, but an earlier production run by another customers wiped them out. A call to Acme and they're taking the flat loads as well. Thank you Acme Auto Parts!

While on the north side of town, a stop at C&P Restaurant Supply to pick up HRC 40' Box car. This car will head to Canton Box on the KP&W light for more cardboard supplies.

A final stop on this run is to pick up EBRR 50' Box car that will head over to Neal's Lumber & Hardware in Empire City. In addition, they'll pull the other remaining box cars and store them at the yard until requested by its owners. Can we hear storage charges being racked up?

Meanwhile, AP #200 will help block the cars that will be brought back to the yard. They'll separate the cars for the KP&W and N.Y.C.T.L. on their own tracks, and then when ready to build the departing train, it will be easy to separate at Selkirk.

Last move of the day for RR-2 is to drop the 3 empties from Mike's Lumber over on the storage tracks. The freight yard has plenty of space to store them - for now..!

There's 3 86' Auto Parts cars and 1 50' DD box cars that are heading to the Ford Plant on the N.Y.C.T.L. that need to picked up. AP #200 will be designated RI-1, Ideal Auto Parts Turn.

The cars are pulled and now they'll head back home...

Due to the length of these 86' cars, they're going to drop them on one of the arrival / departure tracks in Rock Ridge. It's easier to add them to the train when ready to head out.

Meanwhile, there are 4 PS-2 PC covered hoppers that will head out to T&R Gravel on the N.Y.C.T.L. They go back and forth as T&R fills them with sand to be used by the engines on the A.P.R.R. and any leased engines on the system. AP#201 will put all 4 cars on one track so when the train is ready to depart, they'll be easy to block again in Selkirk.

The runs are completed for today. Tomorrow the crews of the day will assemble the train that will head to Selkirk, where the freight cars will be dispatched to both the KP&W and the N.Y.C.T.L.

Thanks for reading!!

Train Derailment On the Penn Central Line

Greetings followers of the Atlantic Pacific Railroad and my blog!

Many of you know that I am part of a virtual op group called the Penn Central Car Movements, or P.C.C.M. for short. There are three other railroads that participate:

Sir John's N.Y.C.T.L. 

PC Ralph's KP&W

Brian's Ralston Creek

P.C.C.M. #65 was taking place while I was on vacation, so Sir John came up with a great story line for my absence from this P.C.C.M. Here's the story!

Since he made this derailment part of P.C.C.M. 65, I needed to add to the story so we can launch P.C.C.M. 66 shortly. 

As the story unfolds, there was a derailment of a Penn Central freight train heading from Weehawken to Rock Ridge on the A.P.R.R. This line is an extension of the PC River Line. The Kings Port & Western sent an engine down with a MOW crane car and some flat cars to assist...

We thank both the N.Y.C.T.L. and the K.P.&W. for their help.

As soon as word got out of the derailment, the A.P.R.R. dispatched a crew, including 1/87th staff photographer Norman to get as many pics as possible. While the line is owned by the PC, there's a vested interest by the A.P.R.R. as there's freight that is not only perishable, but valuable. The FRA, FBI and NYPD were all called in to investigate.

1/87th Norman caught a number of images to document the accident. The case is still under investigation.

The fire department was called in to make sure there were no fires or explosions. 

The NYPD was called in to assist since their expertise in investigations is always welcome. A large crane from the A.P.R.R was sent up to get the cars back on the tracks.

The good news is the engine remained upright and no fuel leaked into the ground. That's all they would have needed is to have some environmental guys poking around!

1/87th Norman, ever so astute and keen, caught these onlookers checking out the wreck. A call to the A.P.R.R. HQ revealed this vehicle and its passengers have been seen at various railroad accidents, including a visit to the N.Y.C.T.L. Turns out these guys call themselves the K.P.R.S. or the Kings Port Railfan Society. 1/87th Norman alerted the N.Y.P.D. of their presence and they were told to leave the area immediately or risk being part of a long investigation at a place that has many bars, none of which have libations! 

1/87th Norman, now knowing they're pretty harmless told them they should go get something to eat and then head back to where they came from and don't look back!

About an hour later they were spotted outside Rock Ridge at the finest diner in the state, MEET AT RALPH'S.  Looks like they were making a call then going to get some grub and go!

Fast forward, and the line is now open. Trains will be running as the A.P.R.R. ran an inspection train thru with no issues. 

We're settled in from vacation, so keep reading the blog as P.C.C.M. #66 is in the wings waiting to launch!

A special thanks to Sir John and PC Ralph for adding the story of the derailment on their blogs. Well done guys!

Thanks for reading!