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By Vic Stone * News from Central VA* Clinchfield Santa train trip report follows the regular news. NS - Siding work is continuing on the B-Line east of Happy Creek. Earth movers have been improving the grade work already done on the line. The siding is on the hillside leading up toward Linden from Happy Creek. Most notable is the west switch for siding, which will be located on a curve. Some pool crews have indicated that there might be extensive running on the ex-N&W Valley Line as a result of trackwork on this section. But, so far, nothing has occurred. A load of new Safetrans signals have arrived for replacement of position lights on the Hagerstown District. There are about 20 pairs of Safetrans color lights, including approach signals to interlockings. It appears that interlocking signals should remain the same (as previous). Coal trains for Bethlehem are running both via the Southern & the Valley. 742 headed north on Nov. 24, bound for the CSX interchange at Alexandria. Mainline Southern traffic appears to remain in a fairly typical pattern. Late connections from Conrail have accounted for most of the off-beat train times. CSX - Major bridgework is occurring on the Washington SD with several work windows issued. Empties continue wb on the North Mountain, mostly on non-Amtrak days, as CSX has become quite conservative in virtually running nothing via Charlottesville during an S, W, or F before 5 PM. Foreign power is still off & on with HATX accounting for most of the leased locos. North Mountain local has returned to the scene with several carloads of coal delivered to the UVA power plant. Doswell-based turn still operates as normal, with most recent power as a GP40-slug set. Amtrak - Northbound 20 has been delayed several times over the last week, resulting in several hours delay, and post-dawn appearances. The new P42's have begun infiltrating the ranks of the Auto Train. So far, nothing has appeared around here on either the Cardinal or the Crescent. Trip Report - We arrived in Kingsport on Fri afternoon to see the P929-22. It was due to depart Kingsport at 3 PM with the press train. So, we went to Copper Creek trestle and awaited. A loaded NS train with pushers headed south. It was now 3:30. The lite pushers go north ... and it's now 4:00. Finally about 4:20, the single unit and eight cars glide across the top span of the trestle in the afternoon light right before sunset. Then, it was off to Pikeville for the night. P930-23 departed Shelby, KY on the cold, clear Sat. morning of Nov. 23 as Santa Claus hoisted candy,books, dolls, toys, and Kodak binders to the eager children by the tracks. But, at the south end of yard, Santa got a stop signal. The yardmaster told them at that Q690 would be coming in ahead of them. The road foreman wasn't too happy ... calling the AO Dispatcher, he said, "We would appreciate not being held up in the future; we have a schedule to keep". CSX did run other trains, but they were held in siding and yards. Any train meeting Santa would have to remain there 20 minutes after Santa would pass, just in case people would be crawling through the cars of the train. Children with bags lined the tracks for miles on end. There were few peopleless spots on the Clinchfield this day. So, P930-23 with C40-8 #7563 continued south with 8 cars including the MKT 403 and an ACL car along with 6 CSX ones. A northbound was siting in Marrowbone siding as Santa glided past. A big wave for the camera by both company officials and Santa. At Elkhorn City, there was the first scheduled stop. Virginia governor George Allen got on, and plenty of people greeted the train. South of Trammel, road construction put a near-torniquet on traffic to Dante. At the church in Dante, more people were waiting for the scheduled stop. Three yarded trains were sitting also. At the infamous Boody siding (at least for the UP steam folks), yet another train was waiting. Coming onto the joint track segment into St. Paul, P930-23 was coming to a scheduled stop. And then, a heave-ho as Santa threw out 2 Kodak binders. Since no one else was around, I could only assume they were for me. As the train headed away with Governor Allen and Santa on the rear, Santa got on the loudspeaker and made sure I knew where they were. And then it was the usual ho-ho-ho down the tracks, as we kept on the go-go-go. We followed Santa down through Copper Creek and onto Frisco, where an empty NS train was waiting to enter trackage rights to head north. The P930-23 passed underneath the NS line with the waiting coal train sitting on top. Onto Kingsport, where Santa detrained for his march through the parade. Governor Allen was whisked away in 2 VA State police cruisers. And the P930-23 was serviced, and then began to head south toward Erwin. It may not have been steam as in 1992, but good weather helped us out this time as another successful tradition continues thanks to the Kingsport & other local Chambers of Commerce, Eastman Kodak in Kingsport, and CSX. Happy Thanksgiving. -Vic Stone
