Eastern Railroad Discussion > Northeast Corridor Photo Help

I acquired a slide taken by the late Walter Shopp in 1975. It shows a train on the Northeast Corridor. I believe that the bridge that the train has just crossed is the Hackensack Draw in Secaucus. I am stumped as to where the photographer was standing when he took the shot. It is clearly taken from an elevated position and the shot is not a telephoto shot.  Any ideas?

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Pretty sure that's the infamous Portal draw. He might have scaled a floodlight tower at the nearby Erie Lackawanna yard or maybe a power pole? The former Lackawanna main line was still in place at that time -- maybe he was on a signal bridge.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/09/18 16:48 by CPR_4000.

I've never seen this angle before - very cool!!  Thanks for posting.

Definitely Portal bridge with an eastbound headed towards Penn Station.  I agree that the photographer probably scaled some sort of light tower or high tension pole.  However, it was probably located on the ex-Erie's Greenwood lake branch, which up until the early 2000's was NJT's Boonton branch.  Due to the Montclair connection which connected the former end of the DL&W's Monclair branch with the Erie's Greenwood Lake branch, the portion of the line that went under the corridor just to the right of this photo is now abandoned.

Is that the New Jersey Turnpike in the background (elevated, climbing highway)?

Look here: https://goo.gl/maps/vBUyWrAHoSU2

If you pan to the right, there's a hill there. The pic may have been taken from that hill.

Mike DeCarlo
Hopatcong, NJ
My Photobucket page

boejoe Wrote:
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> Is that the New Jersey Turnpike in the background (elevated, climbing highway)?

Yup.

In that part of New Jersey, the Turnpike is split into separate roadways.  That is the eastern roadway in the picture.  The western roadway is roughly a mile farther away in this area.

Brian

Snake Hill... once the site of NJ Trap Rock (I think)

It's an interesting picture, that's for sure.

I don't know if the picture could have been taken from the Greenwood Lake line right of way area. That angle would be sharper, and a little farther back.  The fields in the foreground slope up toward the photographer, but he's clearly on some point of elevation.
 

ETA agree that the little hill and maybe a step ladder is the site



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/10/18 07:59 by Lackawanna484.

RichM Wrote:
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> Snake Hill... once the site of NJ Trap Rock

Snake Hill was on the west side of the Turnpike, just to the right of this photo.

Oops... sorry... thought I was looking east... got it, no tall buildings in the background.

Thanks for clarifying.

An early drone?

Mikedc3 Wrote:
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> Look here: https://goo.gl/maps/vBUyWrAHoSU2
>
> If you pan to the right, there's a hill there. The pic may have been taken from that hill.

Is that "hill" where they dumped the wreckage from Penn Station New York?

Brian

Apparently he was on the powerline tower
at 40.75379N 74.08037W

https://goo.gl/maps/Uevi9MxGJXU2

It's the right direction. Maybe they were
erecting the tower?

(But, if we can believe the dates on
historicaerials.com, the tower wasn't
there in 1979.)



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/10/18 11:00 by timz.

Looking at Historic Aerials, there appears to have been an active garbage dump at that location in the 1970s.   Could have been taken from the pile.

Looking at the current Google aerial, there's a park (possibly the old dump) directly to the east of Portal bridge (circled in green).  It looks to be about the right height, and easily accessible.  I highly doubt that he climbed a tower to get that shot - it's not high enough.  My bet is he's along the trail east of the Portal Bridge, shooting west.

Stan Hunter
Fair Oaks, CA

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You can't have a dump without a road for the trucks
bringing stuff to the dump. Such a road would still
exist, to some extent, and would be visible on the
aerial pics.

Looks like there was an older power line along the Erie,
and that must be where the guy was. Such a tower
would be plenty high, if it existed. He probably
wasn't even at the top.