Eastern Railroad Discussion > Moving Day in Union City, IN

http://0.gravatar.com/avatar/3e5706924b99c2e99ef1f023069802e9?s=50&d=identicon&r=GMoving Day in Union Cityby csanders429 https://akronrrclub.files.wordpress.com/2021/07/union-city-tower-a-july-27-2021-x.jpg?w=560https://akronrrclub.files.wordpress.com/2021/07/union-city-tower-b-july-27-2021-x.jpg?w=560Years of planning and fundraising paid off in Union City, Indiana, on Tuesday when a moving company moved the town's railroad interlocking tower about a block west to a park.
The brick tower, which closed in 1968, once controlled the crossing of the New York Central"s (Big Four) Cleveland-Indianapolis line with the Pennsylvania Railroad's (Panhandle) Columbus-Logansport, Indiana, line.
Local interests raised more than $56,000 which was matched by a $50,000 grant from the Indiana Housing and Community Development Agency.
Union City, located on the Indiana-Ohio border, had faced a late March deadline to commit to moving the tower or else it would be razed by CSX.
The former Pennsy line through Union City is gone, but the former NYC line is today the Indianapolis Line of CSX.
Three city streets were closed so the tower could be move on dollies by Wolfe House & Building Movers.
The tower is slated to be restored with the lower level being used as a visitor center with restrooms, and the upper level returned to its appearance when the tower was still open.
It is located in the southwest corner of Artisan Crossing park and faces the CSX tracks in the same manner that it did before it was moved. The park is adjacent to the CSX Indianapolis Line and across the street from the restored former PRR passenger station.
In the top image, the tower is being wheeled west on Pearl Street. The bottom image shows the tower in its final resting place.This fre   

Great to hear. Hope to visit someday

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A neet freindly place.  I videotaped there in October of 2019 including videotaping at night. 
Dick Eisfeller
bigeee@trainvideos.com
Big "E" Productions
www.trainvideos.com
800-832-1228

Great to see this classic structure has been saved.  Thanks for the post.  After the tower closed, the interlocking was controlled from the division dispatchers office.  After the PC merger, there were quite a few trains that moved between Columbus and Indianapolis that used the ex-PRR main east of Union City and the ex-NYC main west of Union City.  That enabled PC to downgrade the former PRR line between Bradford and Richmond (New Paris Tower), a line that was eventually abandoned by Conrail.  Later in the Conrail era, the Bradford Line between Columbus and Union City was also abandoned, with traffic diverted to former NYC lines.  After the tower closed, the building was used by M/W and Signal Dept employees.  

Here are a few shots of the tower in its original location.  Date of these shots is Sept 20, 2015:

#1  A westbound CSX train with a KCS leader passes the tower at dawn.  The PRR crossing was directly in front of the tower, and the wide right-of-way to the right of the train gives evidence of where the PRR double track once was.  The B&O's Dayton & Union Subdivision, which ended here at Union City, would have been to the far right of the PRR right-of-way.  

#2  "Roster" shot of the tower.

#3  A CSX eastbound traverses the crossover between the main tracks.  This location is one block west of the Indiana-Ohio state line.  There is also a Union City, OH, somewhat smaller than its counterpart community on the Indiana side.   

Steve Salamon
Valley City, OH

  

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Great to hear that this tower will be added to the roster of preserved and publicly-accessible towers. It is a Pennsy classic, and I look forward to visiting it when reopened.

This will seal the tower's place on the list of preserved and / or publicly-accessible (or to be accessible after further preservation / restoration work) interlocking towers. Such a list, which appears to be pretty comprehensive, and includes Union City: http://www.bullsheet.com/bullsheet.com/preservedtowers.html

I look forward to a future visit.

Tower fan that I am, I have visited most of the Illinois and Indiana towers on the above list: Spaulding / Union (Illinois Ry. Museum, Union, Ill.); Tower B-12 (Franklin Park, Ill.); Pana (Pana, Ill.); Vandalia (Vandalia, Ill.;,Haley and Spring Hill (Wabash Valley Railroader's Museum, Terre Haute, Ind.); Dearborn (Whitewater Valley RR, Connersville, Ind.); and Griffith (Griffith, Ind.), a favorite photo and trainwatching location for me. Also have visited Greenville at Coopersville, Mich. near my home.

And last but not least, the marvelous AC Tower (Marion, Ohio). I spent the better part of a memorable summer evening up there as many trains passed during the Summerail event in Marion several years ago.

Looking forward to adding Union City to my personal list!

MC
Muskegon, Michigan



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 07/28/21 15:19 by ironmtn.

ironmtn Wrote:
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> Great to hear that this tower will be added to the
> roster of preserved and publicly-accessible
> towers. It is a Pennsy classic, and I look forward
> to visiting it when reopened.

From what I have seen the tower is more a Big Four plant than Pensy. It had a GRS machine, NY Central signs and the tall roof is common to other Big Four towers. 

Also glad to see it moved and slated for restoration. The depot in Union City is quite attractive and houses, I think, some kind of art or cultural center. I live about 45 minutes away and I think it's time for a trip!

Thanks for sharing. It looks to me to be an NYC too, though bay windows were common on Pennsy towers. Is the bay window on the Pennsy or NYC trackside? Hopefully, the tower board, levers, etc., are still available for restoration if not functional.

Victor



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 07/29/21 10:16 by wabash2800.

mbrotzman Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> ironmtn Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> > Great to hear that this tower will be added to the
> > roster of preserved and publicly-accessible
> > towers. It is a Pennsy classic, and I look forward
> > to visiting it when reopened.
>
> From what I have seen the tower is more a Big Four
> plant than Pennsy. It had a GRS machine, NY Central
> signs and the tall roof is common to other Big
> Four towers. 

I didn't know that it had a GRS machine or NYC signs. That certainly would suggest NYC heritage. Pennsy was a strong Union Switch & Signal (US&S) customer for its interlocking machines, as NYC was for General Railway Signal (GRS)..

But not knowing the interlocking machine's origin, nor the signage, it was the architectural features that caught my eye most immediately. And they were more suggestive of PRR design than NYC.

The hipped roof with wide eaves was common for PRR towers, although more in the East than in the Midwest, where they could be somewhat more plain. Same with bay windows. That hipped roof, the broad eaves, and the bay window all immediately suggested Pennsy heritage to me. Likewise the red brick construction, fairly common on PRR.

The following document is an excellent analysis of PRR towers done by a professional historical consultant as a study done for Amtrak. There are 21 photos of towers on the NEC and Harrisburg Line between pages 16 and 21. Fifteen of those towers had bay windows and hipped roofs, and most had fairly wide eaves. Not at all unlike Union City. Yes, they are all in the East, but they were prominent enough on important PRR lines that I think that it is not surprising for me or anyone else to see that bay window and the hipped roof and think "Pennsy". Link to the PDF document of this study: http://www.phmc.state.pa.us/portal/communities/railroads/files/interlocking_towers_on_amtrak.pdf

I am unable to find a similar analysis of NYC towers online. But many NYC towers in the East that I have seen more often had flat roofs or lower-height hipped roofs (though yes, some had taller hipped roofs), and less often had bay windows (although yes, some did have bays). The "flatter" profile has always said "New York Central" to me, the way that the bay window and hipped roof say "Pennsy" to me. But again yes, there are exceptions -- to both. Some NYC towers (some of them your photos, I think, Mr. Brotzman):

DV Tower (Spuyten Duyvil, NY): https://northamericaninterlockings.com/images/dvNYpirmann.jpg?28
CD Tower (Croton-Harmon, NY): https://northamericaninterlockings.com/images/cdNYbrotzman1.jpg?916
SK Tower (Selkirk, NY): https://northamericaninterlockings.com/images/skNYpovall.jpg?541
BE Tower (Berea, Ohio): https://northamericaninterlockings.com/images/beOHunknown.jpg?923
X Tower (Dunkirk, NY): http://cs.trains.com/cfs-file.ashx/__key/CommunityServer.Blogs.Components.weblogfiles/fredfrailey//2110.Commodore3.jpg
CX Tower (Goshen, Ind.): https://northamericaninterlockings.com/images/cxINlustig.jpg?317
Glenn Tower / GU (Indianapolis, Ind.): https://northamericaninterlockings.com/images/glennINDY.jpg?117

As for the Big Four, the most distinctive feature was that on many towers the enclosed upper story often rested on an open steel frame lower story, like preserved AC Tower in Marion, Ohio. This was a rather distinctive design practice on the Big Four portion of the NYC System. Again, yes, there are exceptions, and the open-lower-story towers do typically have hipped roofs.  A few examples of the "open lower story" towers on the Big Four

Cobb Tower / CB (Coal Bluff, Ind.) https://northamericaninterlockings.com/images/cobbINmccord.jpg?314
Burt Tower / BU (Galion, Ohio): https://northamericaninterlockings.com/images/burtOHun.jpg?724
Carney Tower / AK (Springfield, Ohio): https://northamericaninterlockings.com/images/carneyOHneff1.jpg?805

So maybe was Union City a joint design? With PRR provided the building design and structure (and looking somewhat "Pennsy"), and NYC providing the operational "guts", with the GRS interlocking machine and signage (and, I presume, that the operator was also an NYC employee)? I seem to recall having read of such a "joint design" tower somewhere else, although I cannot recall the location or find an online reference.

In any case, there are patterns for each road (others too, such as B&O New Haven and Erie) to suggest some possible "spotting features".  But there is also enough variability to make clear that there was no absolutely firm pattern.
Lots more examples to suggest both patterns and commonality -- and plenty of variability, too -- at the excellent North American Interlockings website (a favorite of mine), from which many of the links above were taken: https://northamericaninterlockings.com

And also in any case the Union City tower is a gem in any case, whatever its heritage.It's great that it is being saved. I look forward to visiting it in the future.

MC



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/29/21 18:16 by ironmtn.

I should have mentioned in my previous post that there is a restored tower in Bradford, Ohio, part of the railroad museum there. Bradford is about 45 minutes east of Union City, just off US 36. The museum is really quite well done, and when we visited it last summer, one of the docents opened the tower for us. It seems to have been pretty much restored, and there is an informative video about Bradford, once an important PRR junction. It even had a railroad YMCA. 

Some day 20 years ago someone will be arguing on Train Orders that the moved tower has always been at the new site and the big four ran past it there.

The good news is that the tower will be there in 20 year to argue about.