Eastern Railroad Discussion > Few From a Recent Visit to Orrville, Ohio

Last winter there was much discussion about the efforts of Norfolk Southern to underwrite track work on the Fort Wayne Line (former Pennsylvania Railroad) in western Ohio. There were reports that NS would be making greater use of the route to take some pressure off the busy Chicago Line to the north. I made a mental note to get down to the Fort Wayne Line during the summer to see if traffic has noticeably picked up. Since the Conrail split back in 1999, the Fort Wayne Line between Crestline and Alliance, Ohio, has seen just a handful of trains a day.

Earlier this month I went down to Orrville to see what I could see in a few hours time. 

(Photo 1): About a half hour after I arrived, a westbound coal train came rumbling past. This was at 11:17 a.m. I would not hear or see another train for another four hours. I had plenty of time to visit the former Orrville block tower and the former PRR cabin car that are on static display next to the former union depot, which is now the headquarters of the Orrville Railroad Heritage Society. The tower used to be on the south side of the Fort Wayne Line and further west. It guarded the intersection of the Fort Wayne Line with a PRR branch that extended between Hudson, Ohio,and Columbus via Akron. That route was the first railroad to reach Akron and it was known as the Akron Branch or the Cleveland & Pittsburgh, which today is the NS mainline between those two cities. Widely known by a later name of Cleveland, Akron & Columbus, the route is now largely abandoned except for a short stretch in Orrville to serve a J.M. Smucker plant.

 

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Around 3:30 p.m. I began hearing a scratchy transmission on my radio, indicating that a train was calling signals someplace not too far away. It turned out to be an eastbound crude oil train. I had read reports that NS has shifted some eastbound tanker trains to the Fort Wayne Line. The train turned out to have a helper set of locomotives on the rear, which are shown going away in Photo 6. Photos 4 and 5 show the train passing the former union depot. The views were made from the steps of Orrville tower.

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I listened to the eastbound tanker train call signals to see how far I could pick it up. As that train passed through Massillon to the east the signals began getting fainter, although I thought I heard the crew of the tanker train speaking with the crew of another train. The Fort Wayne Line is single track between Orrville and Mace Tower -- the tower is long gone -- so it was possible that the dispatcher had set up a meet there.

I waited around 45 minutes before I finally heard what turned out to be a westbound coal train calling signals. It is hown in Photo 7 passing milepost 124 in Orrville. 

Photo 8 is out of sequence. It is the rear of the westbound coal train I had seen earlier in th day. 

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Great pictures. Thanks for posting them.  I'm glad traffic has picked up a bit on that route.  It's always been well maintained for the low traffic levels.
Besides, it's a great place to visit.
RichS

The eastbound traffic out of Chicago is scheduled around a work window on the CF&E. This will probably cause it to bunch up, with big gaps possible, further east. 

I know this winter they were running eastbound oil trains in groups of 3.. Sense things have clamed a bit, traffic seems to have slowed on the ft wayne line again. Work still continues.

Posted from Android

Thanks for sharing. is the tower ever open for viewing? Is there anything inside to see?

Victor A. Baird
http://www.erstwhilepublications.com

GOOD stuff...!! Thanks for sharing.

Shame the caboose is so ragged. That happens many times when someone has the ' bound tos ' to save something but no plans for upkeep.