[PRCo] Re: PRC Interurban Pass Points

[HRBran99 at aol.com]

In a message dated 3/3/03 4:15:58 PM Eastern Standard Time, 
pghpcc at pacbell.net writes:

> But I have Never seen a car sitting at the
> Dormont wye, Nor Clearview Loop, Nor Drake Nor Simmons Loops waiting
> 

I did COT service on 35 LIBRARY and had to manually set the switch and pull 
into the stub track at Simmons Loop until called by a traffic controller (via 
radio) to start an inbound trip. One had to remember to pull out, set the 
switch for the loop curve and plug it. They used very, very large square 
shaped bolt nuts as the plug. Plugging a switch always made me worry, 
probably too much, if I had set the plug tight enough. I would always think 
about a car coming into the loop and derailing because I left a small gap 
between the point and the rail. I guess I always did it correctly. Nothing 
bad ever happened.

<<*Never*  saw an idle car sitting at the end of the line.>>
At Clearview Loop, if the 38A tracks were NOT being used, then a COT could 
back into that track and wait. If it was after 2:30 PM and the 38A was 
running then the COT, or for that matter a car with unusually long layover 
time, would trade out with any car coming into Clearview Loop. Made for a lot 
of car changes at times.

<<But a car was not
sitting online waiting for such an event.     THAT  would be extremely
expensive  --  an extra car on each line just waiting for a
happening!>>
COTs usually went out when there was an excess of Extra Board operators on 
station report. Rather than have a lot of them sitting around, doing nothing, 
they would put out COTs. Sometimes, if a car was late and leaving the city 
loop (downtown) late the dispatcher would send an extra board operator out 
leaving from SHJct on the late cars time. The trade off between the operators 
would then be made inbound after the COT had reached the end of the line and 
started the return trip. Also, I have seen a car readied and sitting at the 
rear of the SHJct admin building. When the late car came inbound, the 
operator would take over the sitting car and leave SHJ on time. An extra 
board operator would take the late car inbound and make one outbound trip to 
the end of the line. This would take care of those passengers downtown. All 
in all there were several methods to get cars back on time.

Another interesting job (looking out my window now and seeing nearly one foot 
of snow in the yard) was 'ice cutting.' Will tell you about this sometime!

HrB