[PRCo] Re: Railroad crossings

[Bob Rathke]

To view a photo showing trolley wire fences that I took on 5/25/57, see:

http://trolley.dementia.org/brathke/BO4034TrolleyWires052557.JPG

First, keep in mind that the scan shows a small area of a large wide angle
photo that I took in downtown McKeesport, so it doesn't have a lot of
detail.  The location was about one block east of the B&O station, looking
east.  Note that the two PRC trolley tracks are in a street that crosses the
double track B&O RR mainline.  The trolley line ran north-south at that
location.

Until the 1970's, the B&O mainline cut right across downtown McKeesport,
stopping traffic at all the intersecting streets 24 hours a day.  Up until
the 1960's, the line handled dozens of freight trains, 8 mailine passenger
trains and B&O's (pre-PATrain) commuter trains.  The photo shows one of the
policemen who directed traffic at the major street crossings.  Also note the
elevated crossing guard tower in the far distance at the right; I believe
that one of these towers has been preserved in McKeesport.

By the late 1970's, B&O trains were using a downtown McKeesport bypass line
via the P&LE RR, and the street crossing tracks were removed.

Bob 11/18/03


-----------------------------
----- Original Message -----
From: "Jim Holland" <PghPCC at pacbell.net>
To: "--- 1714 PRCo__WP__JTC ---" <pittsburgh-railways at dementia.org>
Sent: Tuesday, November 18, 2003 3:38 PM
Subject: [PRCo] Re: Railroad crossings


> Good Morning!
>
> > Matt Barry wrote:
>
> > I believe it was simply like an oval wire fence, if you
> > will, to keep the trolley pole from going off the wire
> > as it crossed the railroad tracks.
>
>
> In fact, this  *fence*  was  *live*  to keep the trolleycar
> supplied with power in the event it did dewire  *and*  remained
> within the fence!
>
> If it went outside the fence it would still scrape against same
> and poles were live so it would still get power but bounce at
> each span wire as long as the crossing was tangent.    But at the
> mentioned photo in Carnegie, the trolleycar tracks cross on a
> curve and it is possible for the pole to bounce outside the guard
> to the outside of the curve where it would not touch the guard!
RR