AARR wrote: ↑Wed Jan 19, 2022 1:56 pm
chapmaja wrote: ↑Wed Jan 19, 2022 12:25 pm
Is the passing siding long enough for a 25 car cut?
The siding next to the elevator looks just long enough to hold 25 cars.
CN has several sidings around Carlotte that are long enough, but I don't know if there are restrictions to using them to exchange cars.
CN would prefer if the CHS went away for a variety of reasons.
1. The switch is on a curve, on a slight incline going side to side across the tracks. It has to be replaced once or twice a year due to wear and tear at a significant cost.
2. They use the local from Lansing to hand off cars and they have to shove from Potterville, tieing up the main.
3. CN wouldn't let ADBF access their tracks in the past. Therefore, CN would shove cars onto the CHS five at a time because that's all the space there was in that siding before they would block an intersection. The CHS 3 would take the five cars down to wherever they were storing them and then come back, duck into the siding for the next five and then they would shove those etc... Meanwhile, this occupied the single-track mainline for quite some time.
LG Gibson has shared video in the past on Michigan Railfans of the CHS working a storage move. Cool enough luck, the engine on the R934 local Lansing job was a blue GTW unit.
At best, I think you'll see this line good for storage cars but there needs to be some track rehab and potentially some way to run around cars better than what's currently there.
Yes, there are still old wooden coaches in the woods out at the end of the line past the elevator. Now would be the time to get them out of there as there's lots of poison ivy around where they are sitting.
They did take a cut of storage 3-bay hoppers from CSX on Tuesday so they are getting some storage biz again which is good.
I'd rank the operations for new business potential:
1. JAIL
2. ADBF
3. Detroit
T-5. Charlotte and Lapeer