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Last Monday night my son and I for a change of pace from Cincinnati/Glendale/Midland Sub railfanning headed up to Carlisle / Franklin to see what was going on. While up there I saw a flatbed rail car sitting on the old CNRR just off of the CSX mailine. It had a piece of equipment that was either headed to or coming from Dupp's up in Germantown. We went back today and it was gone, the derail was in place. We drove up to Germantown and saw that the two bridges have fences on the RR tracks as you head north to Germantown. Went up to Dupp's and saw the switcher and counted about 7 flatbed cars in the facility. Found out from talking to a local at the BP station that they take down or pick up a car about once every 2 weeks or so. I am going to try and put some effort into catcing movement on the line. I live in Lebanon and I ca get up to Carlisle in about 15 mins. The railroad is in great shape, it looks alot better then the crap we have here in Lebanon for the LM&M RR lol.

Where did the CN terminate on the North end ? sections remaining that I'm aware of are in Bryan, Cecil, and Van Wert OH.

Mike

Notch 8 wrote:Where did the CN terminate on the North end ? sections remaining that I'm aware of are in Bryan, Cecil, and Van Wert OH.

Mike

Jackson Michigan

I was under the impression that technically it ended in Moscow MI and North of Moscow was the NYC, I was just told this the other day and was doing a fact check. So did this mean the north of Moscow was the MC and south was the CN ? Many of the towns on the CN really died after the ceased.

Mike

Penn Central and Conrail both sunk some serious money in theline between Franklin and Antwerp (?)where it connected with the Indy line. Weld rail and ties and ballast etc. I think around '83 or so Conrail gave up moving Cincy traffic via the CN and moved it to Buckeye then west. Dupps put some ties and ballast down a couple of years ago.

The Mason Sub isn't in very good shape from looking at it. It meets FRA requirements though.

Notch 8 wrote:I was under the impression that technically it ended in Moscow MI and North of Moscow was the NYC, I was just told this the other day and was doing a fact check. So did this mean the north of Moscow was the MC and south was the CN ? Many of the towns on the CN really died after the ceased.

Mike

It didn't go through Moscow. The line through Moscow, MI was east-west. It was a former Detroit Toledo & Milwaukee line.
The CN ran to the east of Moscow 7 or 8 miles through Hudson and east of Addison, through Cement City and up to Jackson - basically parallel to Hwy 127.

The connection to the Indy line is at Ansonia. As for the CN, when did Conrail pull the plug on operating a local out of Van Wert? (I remember as a kid, seeing a DeWitt Geep parked there, my guess as to when that was is 1979-80 ish) When CR did run the local, how far did they go? Parts of the CN around Coldwater and Latty were run under Designated Operator rules (at least for a while) by the Western Ohio Railroad. My guess is that when the WOHRR quit, those portions were torn up? Along with that, when did the N&W pick up the portion from Cecil to LaFarge?

midland sub wrote:Penn Central and Conrail both sunk some serious money in theline between Franklin and Antwerp (?)where it connected with the Indy line. Weld rail and ties and ballast etc. I think around '83 or so Conrail gave up moving Cincy traffic via the CN and moved it to Buckeye then west. Dupps put some ties and ballast down a couple of years ago.

The Mason Sub isn't in very good shape from looking at it. It meets FRA requirements though.

That's the place I couldn't think of! The original plan was just to West Manchester and then west to Indy on the main line to Richmond. Once they finally got the Union City connection built the Bradford to New Paris and Richmond to Dayton became expendible they went farther north and the Indy line. Of course the traffic and Conrail changed and routing it to Buckeye made the CN line expendible too.

According to the info in Dr. Jim Brown's excellent book on the Cincinnati Northern, the last run of a local south out of Van Wert by Conrail was Dec. 29, 1977.

Me Bad, I was way off on that one... Thanks,

Mike[/quote]
It didn't go through Moscow. The line through Moscow, MI was east-west. It was a former Detroit Toledo & Milwaukee line.
The CN ran to the east of Moscow 7 or 8 miles through Hudson and east of Addison, through Cement City and up to Jackson - basically parallel to Hwy 127.[/quote]

I know people don't like him on here....

But DelayInBlock just posted this today on YouTube of Norfolk Southern running south of Jackson on this line. I laughed when I saw the mile-post marker in the video. Honestly don't see the need for one. Wish that line still went through Lenawee. I remember years ago seeing Conrail and Penn Central near Cement City, once in a blue moon though, and usually with an Alco unit.



I heard that Maumee & Western used to run on part of the CN near Cecil? Can anyone confirm this?

Here's a video of RJ Corman on the CN:



Looks like a streetrun...

The ND&W (former MAW) operates the former CN from Cecil south to the LaFarge plant.

Y@ wrote:The ND&W (former MAW) operates the former CN from Cecil south to the LaFarge plant.

Thanks!

Did they go north of Van Wert for a longer period of time then?

conrailman75 wrote:According to the info in Dr. Jim Brown's excellent book on the Cincinnati Northern, the last run of a local south out of Van Wert by Conrail was Dec. 29, 1977.

No the cn stopped moving regularly north on that date too!! As I grew up along the line remember the last train well!! General portland later lafarge operated and still operates the section from the plant to cecil!!

http://www.fwarailfan.net/contributor/ww-vanwert1.jpg

I found this photo of the supposed last run from Van Wert to North Paulding on 3/31/77.

I saw that too after I posted the question. That makes sense, time wise.

GenXRailMedia wrote:http://www.fwarailfan.net/contributor/ww-vanwert1.jpg

I found this photo of the supposed last run from Van Wert to North Paulding on 3/31/77.

That makes sense because Dr. Brown's book mentions that service on the portion from Van Wert to Paulding ended in 1977 as well, but did not provide a specific date.

The Dupps Branch portion of the CN is quite an impressive little shortline operation. They have a small GE 25 ton that seems to handle their needs. A few really nice bridges out along there too. I did a few tours of the Dupps line when I lived in Dayton, but never got a train. If you didn't know better you'd think it see more service than what actually it does.