Hey Everyone
I was wondering if anyone knew of any hot spots within 4 hours of Detriot.
The ones that come to my mind are Fostoria, Blue Island, and Fort Wayne.
Any other ones?
Thanks
CASO
Just so happens someone else asked the same question not long ago:
You don’t have to go all the way to Fort Wayne. Take US6 East from I69 to Butler, IN. The ex Wabash crosses the ex-NYC main. Over 100 trains a day there.
Sarnia ON and Port Huron MI (Great Beer!!)…You have to ask the locals on were the tunnel is… though…The history museum has some collections on the tuinnle
Does Butler have on particular spot and is it accessible?
Fostoria or Blue Island??
What’s so great about fostoria??
CASO
Fostoria has A LOT of trains through it, and they are constructing a railfan park. Vickers in Toledo also has a lot of action to it, however there might be tresspassing issues there, I do not know.
Butler doesn’t have any particular spot since NS put up the fence behind the bowling alley. US 6 runs parallel to the NYC Waterlevel Route and East of town the right-of-ways adjoin. You might try the pancake house. It sits on the Wabash and has a good view of the NYC line, too.
Fostoria has former C&O, B&O, and NKP lines (all two-tracks through town) cross to form an “Iron Triangle”. The diamonds are visble from public roads and about 1/4 mile (about .5 km) apart from one another. With a scanner you can hear trains call the Fostoria tower for clearance and drive back and forth between the interlockings.
Fort Wayne has plenty (around 100 daily) of trains also, and it’s almost all NS. There are several busy interlockings in town that I could show you if I’m back in-state. As a bonus there is a fair-sized yard, and the Triple Crown hub, so you’ll see lots of roadrailers.
The former PRR main from Fort Wayne to Chicago went to CSX during the Conrail split, but NS dispatches it. CSX is currently leasing that track to a short-line Chicago, Fort Wayne & Eastern that runs one to three trains a day each way.
Deshler Ohio would fit the bill nicely.Its where the B&O toledo sub crosses the garrett and willard subs(three dispatchers working together).it also has 3 wye tracks so you don’t know whose going to go first.In Butler Indiana there is a parking lot near the library that you can watch trains from.The NYC museum in elkhart has also installed a viewing platform at their museum too.Another spot is St.Joe indiana where the wabash line crosses the B&O just west of town but you need to take some backroads to get to it.
stay safe
joe
Who came up with the notion that Blue Island is within 4 hours of Detroit?
the distance from down town Detroit to Chicago along I-94 is do-able in “about” 4 hours…and thats not violating MAS (maxium authorized speed)…its only 278 miles…ive made the trip many times to railfan around Chicago…granted i live about 45 minutes west of Detroit but im 30 minutes north of I-94…Blue island …sure 4.5 hours…but when your railfanning whos gonna pick nits?[:D]
Its actually 5 1/2 hrs from Port Huron. All class 1’s go through Blue Island right? CN, UP, CSX, CP, BNSF, but I don’t remember NS or KCS.
Any thoughts??
CASO
vickers isnt that accessable…but who cares…you can sit in downtown Wallbridge on the sidewalk and see Wallbridge twr…and its less then 2 hours from Detroit…
Yeah, Blue Island is, for all intents and purposes, Chicago.
Durand is 67 miles from Detroit (by rail, anyway), and a good place for watching CN mainline activity. The station at the diamond alone is worth the trip.
Plymouth, near Ann Arbor, is a fully-connected crossing of CSX’s Detroit-Grand Rapids and Toledo-Flint main lines. Not as busy as it used to be, but plenty of amenities nearby.
For sheer quantity, it would be hard to top Fostoria.
Which has more variery Fostoria or Blue Island? Which has more trains??
The only Class 1 lines that actually operate through Blue Island are CSX and CN. The variety in what you see comes from the Indiana Harbor Belt, on which trains of just about any railroad can be seen from time to time. Metra, Iowa Interstate, Chicago Rail Link, and CSX also go over near the crossing on a bridge. KCS doesn’t really serve Chicago.
Which has more variery Fostoria or Blue Island? Which has more trains??
For variety I would go with Blue Island, for sheer number of trains I would think Fostoria would win out. That being said it is not like you will be watching the grass grow at Blue Island, either.
Doo-Ran is a busy place…on week days…there are 2 shortlines in town…the Great Lakes Central (former TSBY) goes thru town twice a day and the Central Michigan is based there…using the old GTW yard running 2 or 3 lines out of town…the Durand Union Depot Museum is neat with many photos and goodies and a HO scale model railroad…the town itself remembers is RR heritage with a small railside park and a good place to eat called the Railroader Tavern…as well as a seperate museum with a GTW pacific behind a fence and the museum is in a formwer GTW passenger car
heres the Durand Union Depot…the GT/CN …to the right of the station is the current GLC(TSBY nee AA) which is shared with other lines thru Doo-ran …meaning CN and Central Michigan…this last line houses engines here…to the left of the station were the parking lot is there used to be another main as the old Ann Arbor thru here had its own track… theres wyes in all 4 quadrents although i think the one over the photographers (my) right shoulder has been removed…the yard and former full circle roundhouse is also behind to the right… the turntable was there upto around 95 or 96 i believe…anyway Doo-ran is a cool place to spend some time railfanning
I think it depends upon whether you want to see road railer trains or not. Either location you will see autorack, stack, pig, coal, unit grain, and general merchandise trains.