GDLK Customers

[AARR]

I went through the old threads and came up with this:

KZ 105:
-Green Bay Packaging
-Interchange with the C.N.
-L.C. Howard
-Pfizer
-Graphic Packaging
-Kalamazoo Metal Recyclers
-Evergreen
-International Paper (Kzoo)

KZ 501:
-J. Rettenmeir
-Van Beek Nut
-Interchange with the Michigan Southern
-Andersons
-Blue Lynx
-Carpenter
-Robert Weed Plywood
-North American Plastics
-Co-Alliance
-Rexam
-International Paper (Three Rivers)

KZ 503
-Otsego
-Marshall Plastics
-Bay Valley Foods

On the Grand Elk from Hugart yard southward, there's a good sized transflow operation in Hugart yard, covered hoppers on the north end (presumably for the bakeries) and crushed glass into NS open hoppers. They also recently got a lumber customer on the old NYC line that now ends at what's left of Steelcase. South of the yard there's a small spur north of the 28th St. bridge where I used to see covered hoppers spotted, not sure if it's still in operation. South of the bridge there's a place that gets, or at least got, tank cars, heck if I know what it is. The GM Fisher plant at 36th St. was a huge customer, but since it shutdown the yard is used for nothing but storage. Across the tracks from them is a steel place that gets a fair amount of coil cars. I believe that's it until you get to Wayland. North of Hugart yard before they reach CSX, there's a siding to the big "Union Station" complex that used to get boxcars and a siding to a lumber customer adjacent to the CSX main, I don't either place has gotten cars since before NS left however.

GDLK has the Bulkmatic transload for flour and RSI for plastic granules. Great Lakes Drywall Supply is the new customer on the old NYC line (The original Steelcase campus is near the end.)

The spur north of 28th on GDLK was used for plastic granules for the Country Fresh dairy down the street. That material goes thru RSI I'm guessing. The place south of 28th was Americhem, now it's Univar -currently not using rail. Place north of 44th is Magic Steel. Zeeland Lumber just announced they are setting up a truss plant in the old North Pacific facility south of 54th.

Can you guys help and fill in the missing customers? Thanks!

[i995impalass]

On the Grand Elk from Hugart yard southward, there's a good sized transflow operation in Hugart yard, covered hoppers on the north end (presumably for the bakeries)

The spur north of 28th on GDLK was used for plastic granules for the Country Fresh dairy down the street.

The covered hoppers on the North side of Hugart are transloaded plastic to Country Fresh.. Spur is no longer used as hoppers have more stroage space then the silo at the spur and I would guess as odd as railroads are-rate is cheaper (just a guess about the rate)..

Oh and just as an edit: GE Stroage cars would be a customer..

[~Z~]

Can you guys help and fill in the missing customers? Thanks!

And when you are done, please update the wiki AARR: http://railroadfan.com/wiki/index.php/Grand_Elk

[Raildudes dad]

VanderLind & Sons in Wayland. Inbound cast iron pipe, stone (1time) salt (1time) and natural gas pipe (1time) outbound veneer logs (Besse Forest Products 1 time)

[StrayWolf716]

GDLK 501:
*Scratch Rexam (Plant shut down beginning of this month, and last of the hoppers were removed in the last couple weeks of Nov.)
*Add Weyerhauser in Elkhart, as the southern-most customer, and turn around point for 501.
*Add Berry Plastics in Constantine. Very seldomly, but it does happen. Flange marks at the very eroded crossings, as well as an occasional hopper back at the plant tell the story.
They keep coming to my mind.
*Add Fresh Solution Farms in White Pigeon, close to CP16 and the Andersens. Occasional reefers appear in the very elaborate, double track lead.
*Add U.S. Aggregates in Bristol. However, this and Andersens in White Pigeon I've only seen serviced by the GDLK 700. Not to say it hasn't happened with 501 though, I just haven't witnessed it.

[GP30M4216]

Allow me to chime in and add my notes, some of which are slightly dated:

Add Crown Vantage in Kalamazoo, for the 105 Upjohn job, they get the occasional boxcar.

Add Kalamazoo Water Treatment for the 105, which in the past has gotten the occasional load of some type of pellet used for water purification.

Add Cytec in Kalamazoo for the 105.

Add Union Camp in Kalamazoo for the 105 unless that now goes by a different name.

I'm sure you know this, but in addition to tankcars, Graphic Packaging also gets (or at least used to) occasional boxcars of cubed scrap paper. They would also get the random covered hopper, but I'm not sure what it's contents were/are.

I'm going to chime in with this information about the MSO's customers. I realize this is a GDLK list, but since MSO's traffic is captive and ALL of it is interchanged through the Grand Elk, this traffic all travels on GDLK too:

White Pigeon Paper (White Pigeon)
Abbot Pharmaceuticals (Sturgis)
International Paper (Sturgis)
Miller's (Sturgis)
Car Storage (White Pigeon & Sturgis)

There are a few other places that have sidings and spurs, but to my knowledge are not receiving rail service at the present time.

I think it would be super helpful to list the cities and towns each business is in/near. I might be able to add more information then.

[Ben Higdon]

GP Epic on the NYC North in Kalamazoo receives covered hoppers. I have to say its been a number of years since I've checked in on them though.

[AARR]

Thanks guys. I'll compile the list into some order and repost. Please be patient though it may be a week or so before I get back to this. In the meantime any additional info is happily accepted.

[canpac08]

lets see here are afew jobs and customers worked by the Grand Elk, not mentioned above.
The 303 now covers bay valley and magic steel.
cant speak for sure but when I was there we did not serve Marshall Plastics, and the 503 was an unneeded job the work done by the 503 in the past was Bay Valley now on the 303. U.S. Gypsum out in Otsego, now gets served the along with KMR (Kalamazoo Metal Recyclers), gets service by KZ100.

As for the 105 job they serve
-GP Epic occasional with a covered hopper
-Pfizer, International Paper (Kzoo)
-Graphic Packaging
-Cy-Tec, L.C. Howard
-Arvco Container Corp
- CN interchange.
As for the rest Crown Vantage,Kalamazoo Water Treatment, and Union Camp,and Green Bay Packaging They don't Jump out at me. Dose not mean not served at start up or after I left.

The 501 serves
-J. Rettenmeir
-Van Beek Nut
-Interchange with the Michigan Southern
-Andersons- spots cars left by 302
-Blue Lynx
-Carpenter
-Robert Weed Plywood
-Co-Alliance
-Rexam - out of Business
-International Paper (Three Rivers)
-Fresh Solutions
-Weyerhauser
-Berry Plastics
-BRISTOL PIPE plant in bristol, now KIBBE-CHEM replaces North American Plastics?
-U.S. Aggregates

By no means a complete or correct list, though I have a list of at one point all the customers served out of Kalamazoo by Conrail/ NS and GDLK. if that might be of help or interest to you AARR. let me know and I can get you a copy

[GP30M4216]

I do believe we need to page DickDV or G. Peet to chime in and help us out with the Kalamazoo customers. They might be more up-to-date. Has G-P Epic always had that name? I had a passing thought that Crown Vantage was a previous name for Epic, but I'm probably mistaken. The Epic name is familiar too, but I'm curious.

Not sure on any recent traffic to Epic, Crown (if they are in fact two different places), or the Water Dept, as it was just a car here and there to each back in the middle of the decade. Graphic is really the staple customer north of BO on the old LS&MS.

In NS days, a single local job switched the line north from BO (and the junkyard just south of the tower), another train went down the PRR/CK&S, and a third went down toward Schoolcraft and beyond. Do these current GDLK Kalamazoo locals (KZ 100, 105, 501) operate Mon-Fri presently or no?

In the past, Arvco Containers was a CN only switch. If they were not doing the interchange at Botsford (it tended to move around somewhat frequently), Arvco was the farthest the CN would come into Kalamazoo. A few places were switched jointly by NS and CN: Green Bay, L.C. Howard, International Paper and Midlink all come to mind.

Also, what about Evergreen? I believe this is just south of 94 on the old PRR. Maybe this has just changed names since I was last aware.

And finally, not to thread jack, but are any jobs presently using the GDLK 13 Transfer Caboose regularly? It seems that between the 100, the 105 and the Grand Rapids turn all have to make the somewhat lengthy backup move out of or into Botsford Yard, and now that the caboose is complete, it seems like the kind of thing to have tag along to provide the crew a safer place to protect the rear end. Thanks.

[AARR]

I do believe we need to page DickDV or G. Peet to chime in and help us out with the Kalamazoo customers. They might be more up-to-date. Has G-P Epic always had that name? I had a passing thought that Crown Vantage was a previous name for Epic, but I'm probably mistaken. The Epic name is familiar too, but I'm curious.

Not sure on any recent traffic to Epic, Crown (if they are in fact two different places), or the Water Dept, as it was just a car here and there to each back in the middle of the decade.

G-P Epic has always gone by that name IIRC. They make food wrapping paper there. Railroad brings in a covered hopper of something every week or so (could be less now). Everything else arrives or leaves by truck.

The Crown I'm familiar with (in Parchment near G-P Epic) is closed...or am I mistaken...or is there another Crown?

Water Dept. used to get an occasional carload of graphite in black covered hoppers but I'd be surprised if they've received anything in years.

[GP30M4216]

The Crown is one and the same since I know it was at the northern end of one of those lines. So I guess that's out. Not sure on the Kalamazoo Water Plant.

[Ben Higdon]

There's Fabri-Kal in the old Mead building on the CK&S/GTW. Conrail served Mead until they moved out and the siding was removed. Thought I'd seen someone write that CN switched Fabri-Kal.

I'm just going off of what I observed in the 90s here, but I never saw Conrail switch International Paper, Cytec, or Arvco...only saw CN serve them. Never heard of Evergreen, maybe they took over the Union Van Camp operation? There's a former Conrail siding to Arvco on the CK&S at the end of the junkyard spur, but I have never seen it used. The active Arvco siding is CN's and originally came off the Grand Trunk's own line through downtown. After Green Bay Packaging relocated to their current facility, I never saw anything but CN boxcars there. I'd be surprised/interested to hear if these customers were definitely being served by GDLK.

Crown Vantage was the last operator of the paper mill in Parchment.

[GP30M4216]

From 2004 until 2008 while I lived in Kalamazoo, I kept track of the things people would post on this and the other board regarding movements, operations, and trains passing through or relating to Kalamazoo. I saved these notes and am working with the Regional State Repository for archives and records at WMU's archive to have the information put into a file for future researchers to have access to.

From what I witnessed during this time frame, International Paper, LC Howard, and Green Bay Packaging (Kilgore Rd. location), as well as Midlink when that was bring switched. I've never seen the NS switch CN's Arvco spur.

In 2008, there was a place called Evergreen on the Upjohn Industrial not too far from LC Howard. From my notes in this time period, someone referenced Dixie as a business north of the diamond. Are they still in business? Thanks for the update on Crown.

I was actually in Kalamazoo yesterday and today for a little reunion with some college friends. No time for railfanning, but I did catch the following sightings: Two boxcars on the Arvco spur, a hi-cube FBOX boxcar, and a 50' standard boxcar, and something like 11 tankcars on Cytec's north spur.

[AARR]

someone referenced Dixie as a business north of the diamond. Are they still in business?

and something like 11 tankcars on Cytec's north spur.

Dixie = G-P EPIC and they are still in business and very busy but G-P tends to buys and sell plants like at a flee market.

Back when economy was much better purchasing manager at Cytec told me they received about 30 cars a week of mostly chemicals but some talc in covered hoppers too. He said they also shipped out by rail some product but not much...maybe a couple cars a week. I don't know how much biz by rail they do these days.

[canpac08]

when I worked the 105 Cytec's lower end was shut down except for the one track outside of the loading unloading area. That is where the CN drops off tank cars and, where the 105 pulls cars from to spot at the upper end. Cars pulled from the upper end are left on the upper end lead for the CN to take back to Battle Creek.The Talc we pulled ourselfs out of Botsford and took empties back to Botsford. I'm not sure how many cars get spotted at the lower end, one of those on-line maps might help to tell. As for Arvco, we started to switch them about the time I worked the 105 and started to get 3-4 cars a week for L.C. Howard. we ended up not spotting them ourselfs due to lack of time but left them for the CN. As for G-P Epic they have a small spur that only holds one car at a time, and from what I can tell only get afew cars a month at best.

[rettop]

Drove by L.C. Howard warehouses and they haven't received a railcar in years--switch is intact, but good size trees growing between the rails; tops of rails are visible, but paved over to make a level surface in truck parking lot and on Vine Street.

[GP30M4216]

There are a few LC Howard facilities around Kalamazoo. There's the warehouse facility on East Michigan Avenue at the Kalamazoo city limits. This is served by a spur off the North Pass at the east end of Botsford Yard. They get boxcars in there and it's switched by a Battle Creek NS job.

Another facility is located in the neighborhood of Lane Blvd. and Factory Street and is served by a switch off of the Upjohn Industrial track. This plant is switched by the Grand Elk 105 job presently.

The largest plant is along Vine Street. Yes, it has a spur (comes off the old LS&MS Kalamazoo Branch just north of Crosstown Parkway), but as you said, has not been used in years.

[GR Ron]

I went through the old threads and came up with this:

. South of the bridge there's a place that gets, or at least got, tank cars, heck if I know what it is.
Can you guys help and fill in the missing customers? Thanks!

Chem Central - south of 28th St (Wyoming Mich) on the Grand Elk - A couple of years ago, their business was out-growing the "dock" facilities on site, so last I knew the loading/off loading was moved to the CSX trans-loading site at Wyoming Yard.

[Raildudes dad]

I went through the old threads and came up with this:

. South of the bridge there's a place that gets, or at least got, tank cars, heck if I know what it is.
Can you guys help and fill in the missing customers? Thanks!

Chem Central - south of 28th St (Wyoming Mich) on the Grand Elk - A couple of years ago, their business was out-growing the "dock" facilities on site, so last I knew the loading/off loading was moved to the CSX trans-loading site at Wyoming Yard.

I had it my head they were Americhem but you're correct,they were Chemcentral. It's now owned by Univar. Talked to the facility manager at the last LEPC lunch a year ago (see you this year? ). He said they had the siding fixed up in anticipation of using rail again. (Americhem used to be down behind Woodland International? or was that Chemcentral - I remember the run down building and tanks )