I am going incorporate car float operations in my layout. But in doing research on actual car float operations I realized that despite the fact that all car floats I have seen photos of needed a tugboat to move from point A to point B and back again. This left me with a question as to why self propelled carfloats seem to have never been developed or used. It just seems to me that such vessels would have made more efficient us of power, space and time than what actually existed.
Irv
Self-propelled car floats are usually called ferries - and there were a lot of them, especially on the Great Lakes. There was also a ferry line, SeaTrain or something similar, that connected several East Coast ports directly to Pre-Castro Cuba. I recall seeing seagoing car ferries being loaded with helicopters (not on flat cars) for Vietnam.
Today there is one old train ferry, SS Badger, still in service on Lake Michigan, but it carries rubber-tired vehicles, not railroad cars. Likewise, the once massive fleet of car floats that served the Port of New York has dwindled down to two. Times change, and not all changes are improvements.
Chuck (long ago Merchant Marine Cadet modeling Central Japan in September, 1964)
Self-propelled car float = ferry. Pays your money and takes your choice.
Mark
Another reason would be simple economics, a barge (carfloat) is much cheaper to build and maintain. If it were to be used infrequently, it would be cheaper to have a barge sit idle between uses. A carfloat could be moved on a contract basis by a traditional towing Co. which would utilize it’s tugboats better, and the RR wouldn’t have the expense of the crew for a dedicated Ferry.
Doug
But, in the Port of New York, the railroads owned the tugboats as well as the floats. A lot of them were reciprocating steam powered coal burners, with the owner’s herald on flat plates attached to both sides of the tall, slender smokestacks.
They were actually used rather like locomotives - moving floats to a facility, picking up the floats already there and leaving the new arrivals to be worked while they took the finished reloads back to New Jersey. Of course, they could only handle one or two floats at a time…
OTOH, barge lighters were moved by the regular towing companies. I don’t know who owned those craft.
Chuck (Modeling Central Japan in September, 1964)
Yes, they were and are called ferries. But here is my idea.
Car float operations in NYC virtually ended in 1976 except for two owned by the Cross-Harbor and Now the New York/New Jersey system.
Under the rationale for my layout, NYS and NYC have decided to encourage more businesses and industry to locate in Long Island and the Boroughs of Brooklyn and Queens. To do so however, they don’t wish to solely depend on trucks for the transportation of goods and raw materials. So they, with the cooperation of the State of New Jersey have reinstituted rail car operations via carfloat/ferry service beteen Greenville Yard and Bay Ridge, Brooklyn. The result os an increase of non-truck traffic on the unutilized or underutilized rail facilities belonging to the the Long Island Rail Road, Conrail and Amtrak/Metro- North in Brooklyn, Queens, the Bronx and Nassau and Suffolk counties. Since 3 states are involded with this (though Connecticut plays a minor but still important part) the Federal Government had gotten involved and has given contracts to local shipyards to build and maintain new car floats and ferries dedicated to rail car service. This is part of an economic stimulus package designed to breathe new life into ares of high unemlployment and few existing businesses and industries to make use of a large amount of vacant and dormant industrial and business facilities.
So does this sound reasonable? Is there something I am overlooking?
Irv
There were car ferries with flat, open decks that were in effect self-propelled barges. They often had a raised bridge (literally, as in a structure spanning the width of the vessel) for the wheelhouse. The Sacramento Northern’s car ferry “Ramon,” comes to mind as one example of this type. So long, Andy
Does it sound reasonable? To this salt-water transportation lover, yes. But, while I am a native New Yorker, I no longer live there. The local pols are unlikely to pay much attention to a desert dweller.
Is there something you’re overlooking? Unfortunately, yes.
The kind of economic stimulus/infrastructure improvement package described would undoubtedly include the currently popular (with the politically influential crowd) cross-harbor rail tunnel from New Jersey to Brooklyn. They, and their media allies, had tried (fortunately without success) to prevent the building of the second, larger carfloat now operating in the Port of New York. If the package, and the tunnel, were approved, any spending on watercraft or water transportation facilities would be killed off as, “Waste of taxpayer dollars,” even if the taxpayers weren’t paying for it.
Your idea is logical, sensible and technologically feasable - three things that virtually guarantee opposition from the junk-science-addicted political community.
Chuck (Modeling Central Japan in September, 1964)
There is currently a car ferry service operating between the Southern US and Mexico…
None of those seem to have operated in the Port of New York. Too bad because there were lots of vehicle ferries that di operate in the Port of New York. Some still do but most of the traffic takes the Verazano, George Washington or one of the other bridges.
I remember that the Brooklyn Ferry that operated between Brooklyn (I am not sure where) and Stapleton in Staten Island next door to the ones that operated between lower Manhattan and Staten Island was more open than not. It was certainly much smaller than the ferries that ran between Manhattan and Staten Island.
In any case, I may be breaking new ground in my efforts.
Irv
Last year the Southern Pacific Historical and Technical Society published David Myrick’s book Marine, Southern Pacific Water Lines covering the marine, bay and river operations. An example of its contents includes descriptions of the open ocean traffic between Texas and New Orleans with New York, Boston, and Baltimore and the extensive ferry system in the San Francisco Bay Area. If railroad marine stuff is of interest, get the book. I’ve already got my copy.
Times, they have changed. The closest thing that remains of any kind of car ferry service here are at least the one or two small Caltrans self-propelled barges connecting islands in the inland delta. They are very small and can hold only several automobiles. The minute-or-so ride across the river channel, amazingly, is free, especially considering the state charges a toll of $4 at the area’s larger bridges.
Mark
Here in the midwest ferries are the mode of transportation of choice. PRR, Ann Arbor, GB&W, Pere Marquette all had ferries at one time or another. The reason for ferries is obvious in two words - Edmund Fitzgerald.
Open deck carferries operated across the Detroit River at Detroit-Windsor and across the St. Clair River at Port Huron-Sarnia. They were operated variously by NYC, C&O and WAB/N&W. The NYC ferries were discontinued when the Detroit River Tunnel was opened and the other ferries were discontinued when the roads obtained trackage rights through the tunnels.
The Lake Michigan carferries, with the exception of the routes to Kewaunee, which connected with GB&W, were mostly a way of reaching terminals on the western shore of Lake Michigan instead of interchanging in Chicago. When it became cheaper to interchange in Chicago, the ferries were abandoned.
All true - except for your two word reason. The actual two words were, “Avoid Chicago!”
SS Edmund FitzGerald was a bulk carrier, far different in design and purpose and far larger than any car ferry ever built or proposed. Car ferries have sunk in Lake Michigan when subjected to similar weather conditions - equivalent to a hurricane or typhoon in a salt water environment. Also, by the time of that famous (thanks to the song) maritime casualty, car ferry business on the Great Lakes was already an endangered species.
Chuck (Modeling Central Japan in September, 1964)
No question that crossing Lake Michigan had advantages over going around but the reason ferries were used instead of carfloats remains Lake Michigan. Ted Turner, when he was into racing sailboats, came to race in the Chicago to Macinac Island race with his seven meter Americas cup yacht. He called the Lake Michigan sailors a bunch of teacup sailors. The worst conditions ever convinced him he was going to die and he spent most of the race below decks curled up in a ball. He has never come back. The Great Lakes are very dangerous waters in storms for a variety of reasons. The only barges I have ever seen are in the Chicago area and used for construction purposes like riprap repair. They do not venture into open waters very far.
There was one large Self Propelled Rail Car Ferry and very modern as well that was the Western Pacific Car Ferry. The name excapes me at 5:00 AM. It resembled nothing more than a barge with a raised Pilot house over the center of the barge over the tracks. It was built in Puget Sound and when it was delivered since it had no berth or dining space the WP sent a dining car, business car, and sleeping car to Seattle for the trip to San Francisco for the crew.
A similar self propelled rail barge operated between Vancouver and Nainaimo and may still be operating today.
Both of the above were double ended.
Al - in - Stockton
If all are crossing a large body of water where there is a high potential of rough seas, then you need a car ferry.
If you have a relatively small operation where you are handling one route and maybe only a few trips a day, then a car ferry makes sense.
If you are handling multiple routes with higher volumes where you are loading multiple floats at the same time, then a car float makes sense.
While in the US Coast Guard I was aboard the Western Pacific car ferry Las Plumas several times. The 450’ vessel was built at Portland Oregon in the 1950’s to replace two tugs and car floats. The single ended ferry had two aporn tracks that branched into four tracks holding up to 27 cars. It had four deisels driving four props it also had a bow thruster and four generators. It ran between WP yards at Oakland and San Francisco and the Alemada Belt Line, Alemeda.
Rob
I don’t know if a self-propelled car floats or not but I’m absolutely certain that cast iron and stainless steel sinks!
I saw a peanut stand;
I hear a rubber band;
I saw a needle that winked its eye;
but I think I will have seen everything;
when I see an elephant fly!
This is slightly OT, but I work with a group that is restoring the old Black Ball Line ferry M/V Kalakala, here in Washington. In my research of the ship I found out that after the bay bridge opened, most of the SP’s ferries were sold to the Black Ball Line (a.k.a. the Puget Sound Navigation Company). In fact the Washington State Ferries just retired 4 Steel Electric class ferries that were built back in the late 1920’s that were owned by the SP and North Western Pacific (itself a subsidiary of the SP.). If you want more info you can visit evergreenfleet.com or kalakala.org. Sorry for rambling on OT, just thought you guys might be interested.