Railroaders' Nostalgia > Mad Dog Chronicles # 111: Changes in North Texas

Mad Dog Chronicle #111 Changes in North Texas

When I first got to North Texas, Huck Shaffer was the Terminal Superintendent. He was in charge of both the Dallas and the Fort Worth yards for both the SSW and the SP. Huck took me around to all of these places. One procedure that sticks in my mind was the way Huck taught me about the interlockings. Huck would take me to tower 55, tower 60 or to DUT (Dallas Union Terminal). He would walk me around in a circle at each of these facilities and describe the ownership of each track. After he did this we would do it again only, now I had to tell him who owned, and or had rights over each of the tracks in that particular interlocking.

Take Tower 55 in 1971 as an example. If you started with the MKT main line in the southwest quadrant and walked around in a circle in a clock wise direction: first there was the ATSF main line, then the SP lead, then the connection from the TP to the SP, then two TP main lines then the connection from the MP to the TP, over which the Frisco had rights, then the ATSF, Then the FW&D which led to the SP, and over which the RI had rights and then the MP, with a connection in the NE quadrant to the TP. Then the TP double mains from Dallas, to the east and then the connection from the MP to the MKT and then you were back to the MKT main where you had started.

In Fort Worth at that time were the ATSF, the Frisco, the Ft. Worth & Denver (part of the BN), the MKT, the MP, the TP (part of the MP), the RI, the SP, the SSW (part of the SP). Over in North Fort Worth, there was also a switching line whose name escapes me, but they had rights on at least one track at tower 60. Of course, there was also Amtrak.

Today there is the BNSF and the UP. Unfortunately, there is also still Amtrak, too. FWD, Frisco and AT&SF are all now part of BNSF. MKT, MP, TP, RI, SP and SSW are all part of the UP now. For that matter, Towr 55 looks much different today than it did in 1971.

Not much had changed when I came back to North Texas as the Assistant Superintendent of the San Antonio Division in the fall of 1975. Most of the significant changes occurred as deregulation took effect and as a result of the various mergers (and in the case of the Rock Island, bankruptcy), took place. However, the North Texas Railroad landscape as I knew it in the late 1970’s is vastly different today. The commodity mix is different. The pattern of interchange and where it is accomplished is vastly different, and at different locations, the function of the various yards is different. Now there is also the commuter operations of the TRE and Dallas DART. Now there are the short line operations.

One would not recognize much of what I might write about of the 1970’s in the operations of today in North Texas. Yet the core is there. Tower 55 is still there. Centennial yard is still there. Miller yard is still there. DUT, much more active than in 1975,6,7,8 is still there. The railroads in North Texas are busier today than they have ever been. True, less is going on at Plano and Carrolton and Sherman and Ennis. However, I would venture to say that the train counts and the gross tons handled are higher than they ever were.

Sorry, all of you rivet counters, the number of different paint jobs on the locomotives is declining and is much less interesting than in the 1970’s. I would put it to those of you who get to fan in North Texas that the operations of the railroads is still just as varied and just as interesting as it was in the 1970,s. It is just being conducted by fewer owners. However, it is much stronger and far more secure than in was in the late 1970’s.

mdo
3/7/05

Is Tower 55 still a bona fide interlocking today? Or is the interlocking controlled from another location?

Tower 55 is controlled from Centennial yard. There are TV cameras all over the area at the old building of Tower 55 that let the operator see. For the life of me I don't know why UP went to all the expense to move control to Centennial yard. Seems a big waste of money and as the years go by the TV cameras will get to showing crummy pictures making life harder for the operator. Since the building still remains (now occupied by UP's railroad police) it would have made better sense to keep control at the building. Oh, well, UP has screwed up in others ways more costly than that!

The only thing that doesn't seem right is your mention of C&S trackage. C&S always ended
at Texline, on the Texas - New Mexico border. Just before their merger into parent BN, the
FW&D absorbed the C&S, though it only operated this way for a few months before the FW&D was merged in BN.

You are right. I fixed the original post. Also added a few other corrections.

Imperfect recollections of the way it used to be.

mdo