Eastern Railroad Discussion > Existing HUMP yards

Given the expansion of intermodal and unit trains, what hump yards (using gravity and retarders) are left in everyday operation in the US? Current operator and predessor.

Note in advance, this is not intended to be a comprehensive list, just the ones I can think of off the top of my head.

New York: Selkirk (CSX-CR-PC-NYC). Frontier (Buffalo) is still there but I believe the hump is still in mothballs.
New Jersey: I believe Oak Island (CRSA-CR-LV) has a hump, but I can't swear to it. Same about Pavonia in Camden.
Pennsylvania: Conway, Enola (both NS-CR-PC-PRR); Allentown (NS-CR-CNJ).
Maryland: Cumberland (CSX-B&O) has one, right. Right? Bueller?
Ohio: Bellevue (NS-N&W-NKP), Stanley (CSX-CR-PC-NYC), Willard (CSX-B&O), Queensgate (Cincinnati) (CSX-B&O). Buckeye in Columbus is out of service, with debate on-going about its future.
Indiana: Avon (CSX-CR-PC-NYC), Elkhart (NS-CR-PC-NYC).
Not going to pretend to know everything still in the Chicago area, but I'm quite confident there are still humps at Proviso (UP-C&NW), Blue Island (IHB), Clearing (BRC), and Bensenville (CP-Soo-MILW). Not so sure about Barr (CSX-B&OCT), Dolton (UP-MP-C&EI). The other one I can think of right off in northern Illinois is Galesburg (BNSF-BN-CB&Q). In East St. Louis there are definitely humps at Madison (TRRA) and Gateway (Alton & Southern). Does NS have a hump at Decatur?
In the Kansas City area you've got Argentine (BNSF-ATSF) and presumably the UP has a hump yard somewhere in town (Armourdale, perhaps?). Northtown (BNSF-BN-??) in Minneapolis has one too. Others I can think of farther west include Roseville (UP-SP), West Colton (UP-SP), Barstow (BNSF-ATSF), Pasco (BNSF-BN-SP&S). Don't know if places like North Yard in Denver, Roper in Salt Lake City, Billings, or Ogden UT have humps now.
Someone else will definitely have to fill in what there still is in the southeast, though I've got think there are humps in Waycross, GA; Rocky Mount, NC; Chattanooga, Nashville, Atlanta, Birmingham, and New Orleans. Does Roanoke have a hump? How about Memphis? I also don't know anything about the yards in Texas.
In Canada, there ought to still be humps at MacMillan (CN) and Agincourt (CP) in Toronto and at St. Luc (CP) and Taschereau (CN) in Montreal. I imagine there may be hump yards in Winnepeg on both CN and CP, on CN in Edmonton, and CP in Calgary, but I'm far from certain about that.



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 10/04/11 08:24 by toledopatch.

Here is a list of yards only on CSX on Wiki.. Maybe you can do the same for UP, BNSF via Wiki...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CSX_Transportation

CR

How could one forget about North Platte (UP) with it having east and west humps there?

ns6669sd60 Wrote:
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> How could one forget about North Platte (UP) with
> it having east and west humps there?

Indeed, only the largest classification yard in the world. But I knew I'd overlook something embarrassingly obvious....

I planned to foam that during my "grand expedition" in 1999, but the motel I stayed at the night before was so awful I bailed out of town at 0400 and ended up in Torrington, Wyo., at sunrise. So other than in pictures, I've never actually seen the place. To allude to an earlier thread, definitely Bucket List material.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/04/11 08:22 by toledopatch.

Yes, Oak Island has a hump but Camden's Pavonia Yard is being restructured to remove the retarders but may retain a Cowboy Hump similar to Enola Yard.
Gonut

Gonut1 Wrote:
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> Yes, Oak Island has a hump but Camden's Pavonia
> Yard is being restructured to remove the retarders
> but may retain a Cowboy Hump similar to Enola
> Yard.

Does Enola no longer have a retarder hump? And a "cowboy" hump is what, exactly? Surely there are no more rider humps, that would be way too inefficient with union labor.

toledopatch Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Gonut1 Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > Yes, Oak Island has a hump but Camden's Pavonia
> > Yard is being restructured to remove the
> retarders
> > but may retain a Cowboy Hump similar to Enola
> > Yard.
>
> Does Enola no longer have a retarder hump? And a
> "cowboy" hump is what, exactly? Surely there are
> no more rider humps, that would be way too
> inefficient with union labor.

I was always told they used the retarders from the old Conway 4 hump to replace the ones at Enola when they returned it to service.

ernie

Hard to imagine as recent as 1970 there where 140 hump yards in the USA.....

Steve

CSX Osborn Yard in Louisville, KY and Radnor Yard in Nashville, TN.

From my book chapter in "Intermodal Transportation: Moving Freight in a Global Economy", published earlier this year by the Eno Foundation:

Table 11-1: North American Hump Yards 2003

Railroad Number of Hump Yards

BNSF 8
Canadian National Railway 4
Canadian Pacific Railway 5
CSX Transportation 13
Kansas City Southern Ry. 1
Norfolk Southern Corporation 7
Union Pacific Railroad 15
Terminal Companies* 6

That totals to 53 in North America, so there's still quite a few left. See Rhodes, Michael, "North American Railyards", St. Paul, MN, 2003 for the complete list. I'm not going to enumerate them all, but under "terminal companies" you have Conrail (Oak Island, Pavonia), BRC (Clearing), IHB (Gibson), TRRA (Gateway), and EJ&E (Kirk). Obviously, EJ&E has now been merged into CN, so subtract one yard from "terminal companies" and add one to CN.

Norfolk Southern has major hump yards in Linwood,North Carolina and Knoxville,Tennesee. Also, the CSX yard at Rocky Mount,NC is a flat switching yard with no hump.

shoretower Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> From my book chapter in "Intermodal
> Transportation: Moving Freight in a Global
> Economy", published earlier this year by the Eno
> Foundation:
>
> Table 11-1: North American Hump Yards 2003
>
> Railroad Number of Hump Yards
>
> BNSF 8
> Canadian National Railway 4
> Canadian Pacific Railway 5
> CSX Transportation 13
> Kansas City Southern Ry. 1
> Norfolk Southern Corporation 7
> Union Pacific Railroad 15
> Terminal Companies* 6
>
> That totals to 53 in North America, so there's
> still quite a few left. See Rhodes, Michael,
> "North American Railyards", St. Paul, MN, 2003 for
> the complete list. I'm not going to enumerate them
> all, but under "terminal companies" you have
> Conrail (Oak Island, Pavonia), BRC (Clearing), IHB
> (Gibson), TRRA (Gateway), and EJ&E (Kirk).
> Obviously, EJ&E has now been merged into CN, so
> subtract one yard from "terminal companies" and
> add one to CN.

Well, Norfolk Southern has more than seven. Looks like the ones it got with Conrail were ignored. Seven would be what NS had in 2003 if Sevier (Knoxville) was shutdown. I believe it has since reopened. Thirteen sounds like a lot for CSX, but I'm not going to try and count them.

CSX at Hamlet,NC.
Not sure if it is still used.

The world's smallest hump has eight tracks and is in Rockport,Fl.(Tampa)
AFAIK know it was built to sort out loaded and empty port dumps.(low covered hoppers that carried dry rock phosphate).
The SCL had two hump equipped GP7's 800-801 used on the hump.The operation did not last long,but the hump is still in
front of the yard tower.
Don't try to see it because it is way down in the port and CSX or the local cops will run you off.


Uncle Joe-Seffner,Fl.

I wonder if anyone ever reads through the posts here. The table is headed "Hump Yards 2003"; NS indeed has seven, including the Conrail yards it got in 1998. Two Conrail yards are now counted under "terminal companies", since that's what "little Conrail" is.

shoretower Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I wonder if anyone ever reads through the posts
> here. The table is headed "Hump Yards 2003"; NS
> indeed has seven, including the Conrail yards it
> got in 1998. Two Conrail yards are now counted
> under "terminal companies", since that's what
> "little Conrail" is.

Sheffield AL
Chattanooga TN
Birmingham Al
Macon GA
Linwood NC
Roanoke VA
Bellevue OH
Enola PA
Conway PA
Elkhart IN

Does NS run Allentown?

ts1457 Wrote:
> Does NS run Allentown?
Yes.
Allentown hump; 17 Nov 2007

---

---

Allentown is definitely NS, it's west of the shared-assets area in northern New Jersey.

I don't think little, inactive humps like the one described for Florida are responsive to the question, especially if they don't have retarders. There are quite a few other inactive humps I could name that would cloud the answer.

chuchubob Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> ts1457 Wrote:
> > Does NS run Allentown?
> Yes.
> Allentown hump; 17 Nov 2007

Thanks for the pictures. Allentown looks like one of the more scenically located hump yards. Maybe we should start a thread on that.

Wait, it's only Tuesday. Shouldn't this question have waited until Wednesday, lol.


> Thanks for the pictures. Allentown looks like one
> of the more scenically located hump yards. Maybe
> we should start a thread on that.

Great idea, please do! Scenic or not, how many hump yards are photographic-able?
Allentown is nicely located but hard to shoot. I believe a road puts you almost
on top of the hump meaning to shoot it well, a fisheye might be in order!

/Mitch



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/04/11 11:57 by Mgoldman.