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Rail News from Central Virginia
Week of May 27, 1996

By Vic Stone

* News for Central VA*

NS - Although 211 is now back on the Southern, traffic on the NS line is
a little lower than normal.  Few extra sections have been running, but
most trains are still running on their scheduled operation dates.
Speaking of 211, it has been through Charlottesville between 5 PM and 8
PM.

Last Friday, the NS Kentucky, was headed south on NS #O59 with one unit.
The car was pulled from Union Station that morning about 11 AM.
Destination - unknown.

342 (the nb CP connection) has now been running at different times
during the day.  The most common, recent trend, is that this train is
running north about 2-3 AM through here.  This is a shift of about 12
hours off from its previous normal times.

Everything else is pretty normal - 742 coal trains for Bethlehem about
twice a week still.  Roadrailers are also increasing in length due to the
new rule allowing longer trains.

CSX - (There still is a North Mountain Sub?)  One couldn't really say for
sure this week, unless one was monitoring Amtrak closely.  Westbound
empties on the Mountain have been quite rare during the last week.  Most
trains, if any, are running quite early in the morning (around dawn).
The locals continue to operate normally, except H756/757 has a new call
time for running - the crew is called at 8 AM on the days of its

operation.  So, once again, an eb out of Charlottesville in the morning,
is possible to catch.

Heavy work continues east on the Piedmont SD, as well as the siding at
Ivy.  Both of these projects have been going on for well over a month
now.  This seems to have influenced the lack of traffic on the Mountain
again this week.

An interesting side note to the establishment of through pool crews -
even eb's (what little there is) are now running through with one.
Yesterday, ballast train came east and operated with a through crew
(except for a pilot engineer).

Last Friday's H740 had a Chessie unit leading east.

On the RF&P side, traffic is heavy and a signal & power failures (twice
within the last week) have caused some delays.  Last Wednesday, a TOL
caused by a broken insulator produced delays for outbound VRE trains
and P053.  Early this week, a power outage caused delays for inbound
trains near RO.  CSX still runs their 3 pig trains sb over the RF&P in
the afternoon as well as Q401.  Action on this line during the afternoon
is pretty decent for a weekday outing.
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