Eastern Railroad Discussion > URR..Any direction will do...

One of the fun things about shooting the Union Railroad is because the railroad tends to make a number of shoving moves depending on what work needs done, one never quite knows whether to find a train coming around the bend behind a locomotive or a caboose. Some friends and I had a nice little dose of the URR on Sunday afternoon that was a perfect example:

1. A URR crew shoves back on the NS Hall Runner at Munhall PA, delivering a large cut of cars into the NS interchange tracks. URR crews take headroom on the runner to make this move, but rarely (at least in my experience) seem to come up this far. Where's that NS northbound when you need one!

After shooting a CSX move in Mckeesport and grabbing a late lunch, we headed over to Bull Run in the hopes of getting an afternoon southbound headed for Irvin of Clairton. As luck would have it, we got two!

2. The first move was that same URR crew we'd seen at Munhall, which was now shoving a train of empty coil gons picked up from the NS southward towards the finishing mill at Irvin. The conductor keeps his eyes peeled to make sure the Bull Run crossing is clear.

3. Going away and through the curves at Bull Run, late afternoon sun illuminates the various coil hoods.

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4. Not 15 minutes behind the first train comes the URR slab train from the slab caster at the Edgar Thomson Works across the river at Braddock. This train shoved up from the mill and onto the main, and now heads south with 3 MP15s (all in the "old" URR paint without even a single yellow end!) barking as they muscle the short train upgrade.
5. Diesel exhaust and heat waves from the hot slabs fills the air.
6. The slab trains cab adds a nice punctuation to a very fruitful 30 minutes at Bull Run.

Thanks for looking!



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/21/13 17:02 by PittsburghMike.

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Was the Union Railroad in the CN purchase of DMIR and BLE??

CP8888 Wrote:
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> Was the Union Railroad in the CN purchase of DMIR
> and BLE??


No. US Steel separated ownership of the BLE and URR properties long before that.

Interesting set of pics!!!! Thanks for sharing.

great stuff Mike,

Randy Allard

That's a load of Bull Run if you ask me! Nice shots!

Jon

Love the URR work, Mike. Is there any pattern to any of their ops, or just kind of show up and wait?

Thanks,
SH

Nice series Mike always enjoy your photos.
There's got to be a 1001 photo ops in Burgh, I suspect you know them all.

Responding to CP888, toledopatch Wrote:
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> -----
> > Was the Union Railroad in the CN purchase of
> DMIR
> > and BLE??
>
>
> No. US Steel separated ownership of the BLE and
> URR properties long before that.

To amplify, through a strategic decision made long, long ago, "the Corporation" (US Steel)sought to retain the direct rail switching link between its Pittsburgh District mills, so it will never be hostage to an outside rail carrier. The inter-mill moves constitute a crucial portion of the production process, of which USS has reserved itself total control (think of say, a CSX- or NS-controlled URR shut down by strike -- that could only leave the Corporation up a shallow creek without a paddle). Unless USS shuts down all its Mon Valley mills, I find it difficult to imagine it putting URR on the auction block.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/22/13 08:52 by billio.

billio Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Responding to CP888, toledopatch Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > -----
> > > Was the Union Railroad in the CN purchase of
> > DMIR
> > > and BLE??
> >
> >
> > No. US Steel separated ownership of the BLE and
> > URR properties long before that.
>
> To amplify, through a strategic decision made
> long, long ago, "the Corporation" (US Steel)sought
> to retain the direct rail switching link between
> its Pittsburgh District mills, so it will never be
> hostage to an outside rail carrier. The
> inter-mill moves constitute a crucial portion of
> the production process, of which USS has reserved
> itself total control (think of say, a CSX- or
> NS-controlled URR shut down by strike -- that
> could only leave the Corporation up a shallow
> creek without a paddle). Unless USS shuts down
> all its Mon Valley mills, I find it difficult to
> imagine it putting URR on the auction block.

Billio, you hit the nail on the head. One of the neat things about Bull Run is that all the interplant business passes through there. You basically most of URR's traffic aside from the 2 daily ore trains off the B&LE....the entire steel making process passes you in multiple directions:
-coke from Clairton north to ET (and the CSXT interchange), where it is mixed with ore, scrap metal, and limestone to make steel slabs
-steel slabs from ET to Irvin where it is rolled into coils.
-coiled steel from Irvin to the NS, CSXT, and W&LE interchanges.

Back "in the day" (ie prior to the 80's) there also used to be an almost continuous stream of molten slag moves as well going to the slag dumps up on the Mifflin Branch....now the slag is reclaimed on site at ET in Braddock.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 01/22/13 14:10 by PittsburghMike.

sharris Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Love the URR work, Mike. Is there any pattern to
> any of their ops, or just kind of show up and
> wait?
>
> Thanks,
> SH

Thanks to all for the kind words.

Scott: there probably is a pattern, but I don't fan them consistently enough to really get a handle on it. I usually just show up and wait...sometimes you can wait 3 hours and not see anything turn a wheel, and then you get 2 or 3 moves inside of an hour.

PittsburghMike Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> billio Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > Responding to CP888, toledopatch Wrote:
> >
> --------------------------------------------------
>
> > -----
> > > -----
> > > > Was the Union Railroad in the CN purchase
> of
> > > DMIR
> > > > and BLE??
> > >
> > >
> > > No. US Steel separated ownership of the BLE
> and
> > > URR properties long before that.
> >
> > To amplify, through a strategic decision made
> > long, long ago, "the Corporation" (US
> Steel)sought
> > to retain the direct rail switching link
> between
> > its Pittsburgh District mills, so it will never
> be
> > hostage to an outside rail carrier. The
> > inter-mill moves constitute a crucial portion
> of
> > the production process, of which USS has
> reserved
> > itself total control (think of say, a CSX- or
> > NS-controlled URR shut down by strike -- that
> > could only leave the Corporation up a shallow
> > creek without a paddle). Unless USS shuts down
> > all its Mon Valley mills, I find it difficult
> to
> > imagine it putting URR on the auction block.
>
> Billio, you hit the nail on the head. One of the
> neat things about Bull Run is that all the
> interplant business passes through there. You
> basically most of URR's traffic aside from the 2
> daily ore trains off the B&LE....the entire steel
> making process passes you in multiple directions:
> -coke from Clairton north to ET (and the CSXT
> interchange), where it is mixed with ore, scrap
> metal, and limestone to make steel slabs
> -steel slabs from ET to Irvin where it is rolled
> into coils.
> -coiled steel from Irvin to the NS, CSXT, and W&LE
> interchanges.
>
> Back "in the day" (ie prior to the 80's) there
> also used to be an almost continuous stream of
> molten slag moves as well going to the slag dumps
> up on the Mifflin Branch....now the slag is
> reclaimed on site at ET in Braddock.

I was fortunate to see the dumping of slag on he Mifflin Branch at night. Pretty impressive. I wish I would have taken some pictures.
John

Well done Mike. You picked a perfect title for your post.
John

jmbreitigan Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Well done Mike. You picked a perfect title for
> your post.
> John

Thanks john.

Great photos! I always like the sound of the trains as they pull up the grade at Bull Run. I was down there Saturday and thought we were going to get a move but the train had air problems with a car and got a lengthy delay.
As others have said, I enjoy your photos a lot.

RAD