Thought I’d share some of my railfanning trip to Muncie, IN. with the forum and maybe glean some information from some of you guys for future use.
I went up to Muncie last Friday, Feb. 23rd. This is where the NS New Castle District crosses over the CSX St. Louis line. There is some interesting track geometry here, and I finally made sense of it using my SPV Great Lakes East atlas. In the past I would just go riding aimlessly up and down streets and get hopelessly confounded by the layout of the tracks. The CSX is double tracked while the NS is single. Yet, the most trains were on the NS which surprised me. They ran four trains through in about two hours time while I saw only one manifest freight on the CSX ( but it did have a very tired looking SP tunnel motor ). Got to photo a road-railer up close as it was waiting east of Walnut street crossing for a train off the Frankfort line. Its amazing to me that a truck trailer will pull that kind of weight. Seems like one of the trailers at the front would pull apart from the strain. I didn’t count, but I would say this thing had well over one hundred trailers lashed up.
I plan to go back to this area again. I know we have some forum members who know the rails in the area and I would like to hear from them. My railfanning days are sometimes short, so any info on the best times to catch trains would help. And if you know of a good local eatery that would be good, too!
One question that I have is why the CSX line across Indiana (Muncie, Indy, Terre Haute) doesn’t seem to have much traffic. This is a well maintained looking line, double tracked, and it seems to be signaled in both directions. If you look at the route it takes from upper Ohio across Indiana to St. Louis, it would seem like it would see an endless parade of trains, yet this doesn’t appear to be the case, at least not on the days I happen to be watching.
I apologize for the lack of photos. I do have a digital camera, but, to be honest, I don’t care to use it mu
I believe that line was busier under Conrail. Did NS take a lot of the traffic, or does CSX prefer to interchange at Chicago and Memphis instead of St. Louis ? Can the TRRA be blamed for that ?
Does NS still serve Indianapolis with a local over CSX from Muncie ?
Wish I had answers for your questions Dale, but I don’t know too much about CSXs operations even though I live here in Indianapolis. I, for one, have never seen a NS train running on the CSX line, but, with the wide assortment of motive power on trains now days, one could have went past and I wouldn’t have known if it was CSX or NS.
I was told once by a local railfan that the St. Louis line was way busier under Conrail than it is now. Why this changed is something I would like to know myself. It would seem that CSX interchanges more at Chicago if you look at the amount of traffic on the line across northern Indiana, former B&O route. They have one other line across the southern part of the state that sees very little use, it was a former B&O route from Cincinnati to St. Louis.
I’ll try again…This afternoon I tried to post almost a full page of data I had typed. Just general info of the Muncie area and rail faning…but went to post it and got a screen of such and such N/A, etc…and it was lost. So we’ll at least post a few of what I remember again. Hopefully.
NS line enters north side of Muncie and down into the city and past the former C&O Depot, now the beautiful Trail Head. Yes, it is open daily and has RR artifacts inside and Trail related info, etc. Stop and take a look.
Also if you care to check out 3 RR bridges, walk on our trail {north}, from the Depot just about a quarter mile. An abandoned {in the 70’s}, 2 span thru girder bridge, formerly served the Pennsylvania RR…The Ex. C&O bridge now carries the Trail across White River. 3rd bridge is to the right, upstream just several hundred feet and it carries the incoming from the north, NS current rail line.
This line loops around the east side of Muncie and back to the west then and crosses Walnut {where you were}, and heads to all points south. 3rd NS line comes in from the northwest, and is noted as the Frankfort line…That line crosses the double track {CSX}, just west of where you were on Walnut st. and joins the aforementioned north / south NS line.
The ex. NYC, Conrail and now CSX double track is east / west through Muncie and I agree has less traffic than when Conrail was the operator. I have no idea why…It still sees a fair amount of traffic through here and perhaps you caught it on a several hour “dead time”. Years ago as NYC, it supported 6 or so passenger trains through here before the birth of Amtrak. Our Union station was demolished perhaps 15 or so plus years ago and was located right at the Walnut st. crossin
I had relatives who lived in Muncie and yes indeedy, the Conrail line was hopping pretty good back in those days. I’m not sure what CSX has going on now, but from the sounds of it…now just a shell of its former self.
According to a friend of mine used to work for NS out of Muncie, after the 1999 “deal” was struck involving Conrail, NS did run a 7 day a week train from Muncie East Yards to Indy (Hawthorne) and then returning to Muncie. It connected to the CSX Indy Line via a hand thrown turnout west of CP 230 It may have been called the 455, but don’t quote me on that. This train most often died on the law before even getting back to Muncie and always a very long train at that. He also mentioned a coal train that came to Muncie via NS then turned due west on the ex-Conrail Indianapolis Line to Indy…maybe IPL coal??
An NS train currently goes to Indianapolis via ex-Conrail trackage south out of Alexandria. Some sort of local which is 5 days a week. I think it’s still called the B32.
Forgot to mention in my info above: Across the street {Kilgrore}, at Bruner’s Family Restaurant the double track CSX line passes…So grab a window seat and it’s right outside to keep a check on.
Modlelcar; Is the NYC & NKP tower still there at the end of Maceidonia st. ? In 1958 we lived just 2 doors north of the tower . Murrey Woods was the evening operator then. Then the action was hot and heavy NKP had a lot of white flag extras. Those were the days my friend .
Smoke and cinders abounded , and the friendship of murrey . Respectfully , Cannonball
…Yes, the CSX double track is class 1 railroading ROW…and as I mentioned yesterday on here, there are periods of “dead times” on the line. There is a fair amount of traffic running on it through Muncie though.
But, not as much as when it was Conrail operated…It really was a busy line then. Not sure of what the count was then but it was substantial.
Cannonball:
Just checked my detailed map here this morning as to where my best location will be to take a peak of the question does the tower near Macedonia still stand…Believe if I simply go across the crossing there on Ohio st. near the old Warner Gear building and look east, I’ll be able to tell for sure if it indeed is still there or not…It’s raining pretty good here this morning and we’re under a threat of severe weather but we’ll get a peak at that area soon and be able to get an answer.
I was driving along Massachusetts Ave in Indy and watched an NS powered local switching on the B-Line. I couldn’t tell if it was the B32 out of Marion or the Lxx out of Muncie or just borrowed power. I have heard that the B-line is busier at night than it is during the day. Either way, NS runs more trains in Muncie than CSX.
6th street is a good place to watch, as New Castle District trains come north into the downtown area in the southwest corner of downtown and either swing west to go to Alexandria (and then north to Elkhart or on to Frankfort) or swing east onto the B-Line.
…We live a bit northwest of Muncie area and south about a mile from the Frankfort line and that line really does seem to have a fair amount of traffic at night as we can often hear it from our location.
Thanks for your response, I was hoping to hear from you since you are in Muncie. You are correct on the RoadRailer time, it was approximately 11:30AM when I saw it. I have printed out your post and placed it in my SPV atlas to refer to the next time I’m in Muncie. Must have drove past the former C&O depot and not realized it. Will visit on my next trip. Was planning to go today, Thur., Mar. 1st, but we are supposed to get rain with hail mixed in…doesn’t sound like railfanning weather to me.
When I was at Walnut St., I walked east to the next crossing, can’t remember the street name. There was a building there that looked like a former station, its now occupied by Dague Supply if I recall correctly. Was this a former station? It sits on the CSX side of the ROW and you can tell that it was once a beautiful old building that is now crumbling.
Do you know the history of any of the industries there in Muncie along the tracks? I recall seeing a place called Delaware Machinery & Tool and there were a couple of big buildings that looked like they were steel fabrication businesses. I have always had an interest in the industrial “smokestack” era of the U.S.
Another place I may try is south of Muncie at a little town called Springport. The tracks run straight through and you can see trains approaching from far away. Would be a good autumn season location.
I have been along Massachusetts Ave. many times. Usually park at the entrance to the FedEx Ground facility. This is where the former Indianapolis Union diverges to the south at Belt Junction.
I have never heard of this being called the B-line. Do you know why its called this?
The CSX track is still in great shape. You can look at this road and tell it was set up with high volume, high speed in mind. It would have been something to see a passenger train thundering along Pendleton Pike (US 36) in notch 8!!
As for Hawthorne Yard, I’ve been to this area a few times but I get bad vibes around it. Although I’ve never been confronted by the CSX bulls, I get the feeling railfans are not welcome. Same for Avon Yard area. Not that I would ever consider trespassing on their property, I feel that trespassing, especially at Hawthorne, is probably a problem and one that they are tired of. You can easily see that the yard at Hawthorne is a shadow of what it used to be. There are a lot of “brownfield” looking areas around it. To the west is the former IPL (Duke Energy now) cok
As far as tonnage goes, both the CSX line and the NS line to the south carry between 40 and 60 million gross tons per year, while the NS lines to Fort Wayne and Frankfort carry 20 to 40 MGT.
Back in 1973, the PC line carried 30 to 40 MGT, while the C&O (Cincinati-Muncie-Chicago) and the N&W (Lima-Muncie-Frankfort) had 10 to 20 MGT. The N&W New Castle-Fort Wayne was just a branch.
The Penn Central merger added traffic through Muncie, off of the PRR between Indy and Columbus. The 1976 Conrail merger added the PRR line (to Cincinnati) to N&W, and the 1982 NS merger put a lot of traffic on it. It certainly looks like the Conrail split took traffic away. Muncie seems to feel the effects of every eastern merger.
I have an office with a window view 20 stories up in downtown Indy overlooking that line. I can’t look out the window without seeing a train on that line. I never realized just how busy that line was.
Sure enough, as I am writing this, a train is coming into view now. Manifest, two SD-70s, one SD-40-T in SP livery.
The only thing that surprises me about this line is the absolute absence of coal, at least that I have seen thus far.
As for NS, I know it runs a coal train (that stops before coming in view of my office) into the central-east side of Indy. Also, I believe NS’ manifest trains come in at night.
Gabe
P.S. No kidding: there is yet another train coming into site as I am writing this e-mail, no less than three minutes from seeing the first one. The GP-38. I love my office.
I must have bad luck. Whenever I intentionally go somewhere along this line to watch trains, they dry up!
Yet, it is as you say. I have been at the IUPUI parking garage top level waiting to go to a class and when I look over towards the CSX line, there goes a train. And if I look back a few minutes later, there goes another one. Yet, if I go out to Fortville with the intentions of photographing trains, there won’t be any for hours!
As for coal, there is always a string of coal cars sitting across from the Indy Zoo. I assume they are for the steam plant near the RCA dome. I’ve never seen them in motion, they are just always there. The coke plant out on English Ave. gets coal from somewhere also. I’ve never heard where any of this coal comes from. It does seem like most of the trains through Indianapolis are manifest freights. Lots of tank cars on these trains, too.
…Simply by witnessing the traffic on CSX here now in Muncie, I can definitely say the traffic level is lower than it was with Conrail operation. Can’t answer how much traffic may travel through late at night as it’s beyond us hearing it especially in the Wintertime when the house is all closed up.
Cannonball:
I took that drive over into Muncie and drove down Ohio st. and at the NS / CSX {parallel}, crossing on Ohio and looking to the east where the tower should have been, I found nothing except 2 well kept rail lines ROW stretched out to the east. This location is right at the corner of the old “uptown” location of the former Warner Gear Plant…Now a business, and I believe in part of it the local bus garage is located. So looks like the tower is no more…
The steam plant gets its coal from the Indiana Southern. It doesn’t appear that they are in motion ever, because a 44-ton switcher sets about three or four cars out at a time, but it does this all day. Actually, quite a bit of coal gets moved. But none of it comes in on the St. Louis line; rather it comes from Southern Indiana on the ISRR.