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Railroads of Battle Creek - Pure Michigan Trains

Battle Creek, the birthplace of modern breakfast cereal, is an unassuming railroad town, and where we take you in this edition of Pure Michigan Trains!

Located in SW Michigan, Battle Creek is where CN's former Grand Trunk main crosses the old Michigan Central Main, now home to Amtrak's Wolverine Services.

While both mainlines used to take their own ways through town, in the 1980s the city and railroads agreed to rationalize, leaving us with a single busy "corridor", handing all trains through this modest midwestern city.

We'll spend a day on the 2-mile long segment of rails, where lengthy CN freights and zippy Amtrak services share the tracks, accompanied by classic searchlight signals and great urban-industrial scenes.

Norfolk Southern is also present in Battle Creek, but on this Saturday, they operated no trains. Therefore aside from a glance at Hinman yard, this is a presentation in full CN and Amtrak colors.

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Equipment: Sony PJ790 Camcorder

Copyright 2016 Thornapple River Rail Series
Edited with Cyberlink PowerDirector 13

Nice video, but the name of the tower where the GT and MC or NYC crossed each other was called Nichols. Baron wasn't created until the consolidation of the two lines through town was formed. The very west end of Baron when it was first built was directly outside of the doors to the dispatcher's office in the old depot that still stands.

I like your video's, Saturn. Thanks for posting.

Hogger1225 wrote:Nice video, but the name of the tower where the GT and MC or NYC crossed each other was called Nichols. Baron wasn't created until the consolidation of the two lines through town was formed. The very west end of Baron when it was first built was directly outside of the doors to the dispatcher's office in the old depot that still stands.

Darn, that's unfortunate. I would certainly have mentioned that. I never saw any reference to this while I was browsing around for historical content. Was the tower staffed right up to the consolidation?

I'll be sure to add this to the description to clear it all up. Thanks Hogger!

395 isn't Toronto - Chicago. It was Sarnia to Chicago (BNSF)
397 no longer runs to Memphis. It terminates at Kirk yard in Gary IN.

Nichols Tower was staffed right up to the consolidation by Conrail employees. One can just about picture the old location in the video by just visualizing the CR track continuing to curve to the right and mentally placing where they would cross the CN tracks. (This would be in the shots at the east end of Baron looking west). Google Earth shows it pretty plainly if you know where to look.