Fort Wayne Secondary/Gary Branch

[MiddleMI]

Is the Fort Wayne Secondary/Gary Branch between Tolleston and where it merges with the City Track currently in use for anything? Was researching it a bit and getting different answers as to ownership, use, etc. It's only connected at Tolleston to the very lightly used east half of the CSX Porter Subdivision, and the Porter Sub customer on this portion of the line ships stuff west, so the connection wouldn't be used for that customer.

Also, is CSX the owner? I read somewhere that Norfolk Southern uses it, but I can't figure how or what for, since there is no diamond at Tolleston, anymore, for through traffic from the southeast.

At its northern end, it's been rearranged over the years so that it merges into something called the "City Track" (not sure who owns this one, either) which is an industrial spur that serves a customer or two to the southeast. Very soon after this track curves northeast to merge with the CN's Matteson Sub and fly overs the parellel CSX Barr Sub and NS Chicago Line before curving southeast to get reach Kirk Yard (this is CN's yard, right)?

Just trying to make sense of all of this.

Older map of this area before the airport expansion:

[Saturnalia]

I don’t believe that either the Pennsy (south) or the Wabash (north) under the CSS has been used in quite some time. I’ve never seen a train on either, and the rails are pretty rusty with the crossing on US 12 looking very disused. The Pennsy appears to have been fully allowed to overgrow north of the Toll Road, while the Wabash is tied in at Tolleston and connects to the EJ&E City Track and ultimately Kirk Yard.

The EJ&E City Track goes east back through downtown Gary and eventually connects with the CSS at Goff. It is either leased or owned by the CSS now and sees a near-daily turn to Kirk, mostly with traffic between the USS Gary Works and their Midwest Steel plant in Burns Harbor. Lots of unfinished coils make up the bulk of that traffic.

[MiddleMI]

I don’t believe that either the Pennsy (south) or the Wabash (north) under the CSS has been used in quite some time. I’ve never seen a train on either, and the rails are pretty rusty with the crossing on US 12 looking very disused. The Pennsy appears to have been fully allowed to overgrow north of the Toll Road, while the Wabash is tied in at Tolleston and connects to the EJ&E City Track and ultimately Kirk Yard.

The EJ&E City Track goes east back through downtown Gary and eventually connects with the CSS at Goff. It is either leased or owned by the CSS now and sees a near-daily turn to Kirk, mostly with traffic between the USS Gary Works and their Midwest Steel plant in Burns Harbor. Lots of unfinished coils make up the bulk of that traffic.

Okay, who is the current owner of all of these parts? I heard that NS uses trackage rights over the Gary Branch between Tolleston and the City Track, so I assume that means CSX owns this. But I couldn't figure out why NS would even need trackage rights, here, since it can't be accessed from the Fort Wayne Line on the other side of Tolleston. When these two were still connected it may have made sense if they wanted more direct access to customers in the city. But as it is now with access only from the very lightly used eastern half of the Porter Sub, it stirkes me that it doesn't have any use except as a redundancy for westbound traffic on the NS Chicago Line in the case that the Chicago Line is down for some reason. And that's only true if NS has trackage rights over the CXS Porter Sub. It's certainly not a short cut, and it doesn't look like eastbound traffic on the Chicago Line could access it, anyway.

[justalurker66]

The former NS alignment was transferred to CSX north of the river and the NS moved east. Both to provide additional distance from the airport runways. Look north of the river for the shift.

Near Tolleston the NS line to the east was removed and the line now merges into the CSX track then follows the NE quadrant connection to the east of Tolleston. The diamond has yet to be replaced. CSX installed new signals near the CSS/Toll Road and new crossing signals on 5th St. It looked like they were preparing to reconnect the north end and put back in the diamond before the work stopped.

I'm not sure how often the connection now sees use. Or how much service Indiana Sugars gets via the connection put in between the old NS alignment and the CSX track east of Tolleston.

[MiddleMI]

So who owns it ('Gary Branch') south of the river? Again, I'm not sure why the line wouldn't be transfered to anyone in full or what business either CSX or NS would have one the line. I don't understand its purpose. Are we saying that it's ostensibly a line that theoretically functions as separate branches north and south of the river, with NS accessing it from the north from the Chicago Line and CSX accessing the part below the river from the south via the Porter Sub?

It's interesting, because NS system map only shows trackage rights over the line, and CSX system map doesn't show the line as part of its system, at all.

NS:



CSX:

[justalurker66]

There was an ownership swap north of the river.
Purple line is former CSX (track out of service) transferred to the airport.
Yellow line is former NS transferred to CSX.
Green line is track transferred to NS now ending at CN's City Track.

At Tolleson the red line was the former NS Sugar Track that was removed. A new connection was made to allow NS trains to exit the CSX and head to CN Kirk Yard. A new connection (in green) was also made to connect the east end of the Sugar Track to the CSX Porter Branch.

[MiddleMI]

Really was just interestec in the existing stuff. There appears to be a single line in use northwest of Tolleston (the 'Gary Branch'). That's all I'm interested in, because getting into the history is confusing. What is the connection wye for the northeast quadrant for?

The NS keeps getting brought up. The rails on all four sides of Tolleston are CSX, right? What purpose would the NS have in this area, at all? Traffic coming from the east or southeast are using the Chicago Line and Chicago District, respectively, right?

[justalurker66]

The connection was built to allow NS access from the Porter Branch to their line ending at CN Kirk Yard when NS abandoned the east/west portion of the Sugar Track. Years ago I (after the reconstruction) would see NS trains on that link. I don't visit that part of town often.

CSX does not travel north of Tolleston on their track or NS' track.

[MiddleMI]

Okay, so between Tolleston and the river, the Gary Branch is owned by CSX and is not used. And between the river and the City Track, it is owned by NS. But what does - or conceivably could - NS do with this NS Gary Branch between the City Track and the river? I guess I'm not understanding that. This essentially would function as a dead-end. As far as I can tell, there are no customers along this short stretch, so at best it looks like you could use it for storage.

[justalurker66]

What you are apparently not understanding is that there are two separate lines from Tolleston to the northwest. One owned by CSX and one owned by NS. The NS line ends at the CN City Track at the northwest end and the CSX line on the southeast end at Tolleston. CSX' line continues past the CN line. It is currently out of service. The property used for each line has shifted north of the river, but the lines remain the same.

CSX could connect the northwest end to their line north of the CN line and it appeared that they planned to do that at some point and cancelled those plans. CSX could also restore the diamond if there was a need to have through trains from the CFER leased lines. Apparently there is no pressing need for either but the options remain.

[MiddleMI]

So the Wabash line (east/north) was an NS line: Gary Branch. When they took out portions of this line to the east of Tolleston, the Gary Branch was connected to CSX's Porter Sub and Indiana Sugars was connected to the Porter Sub to allow NS to service Indiana Sugars via somewhere u northwest of here near CN Kirk Yard? Is this right?

Then when they'd planned to expand the runway at the airport, the old Pennsy line (west/south) was - the Fort Wayne Secondary - was purchased by the airport. Apparently, this line hadn't been used even at the time (2008?); CSX hasn't had any operations north of Tolleston, here. Simultaneously, NS transferred ownership of the NS Gary Branch to CSX for whatever reason, and negotiated trackage rights over it.

So, if this track was to be used for anything in its current configuration, would it just be to leave or pick up cars from CN Kirk Yard? Because the tracks north of the end of the Gary Branch don't appear to connect back to any of CSX or NS's trackage, either directly or indirectly. So, NS still services Indiana Sugars, but just over trackage rights over the Porter Sub and IHB to the west?

[justalurker66]

The work was done in 2018. Here is the discussion during the rebuild.

viewtopic.php?f=27&t=35622

[MiddleMI]

With most of all that figured out, I thought I'd ask about something else in this area. It seems that right at or just after Pine Junction, the old B&O passenger line (Today's CSX Lake Subdivision) branched off to travel up the lakefront. It's been pared down considerably since then, apparently, and essentially split in two. The first part stretching a short distance in between Pine and CP501, and then restarting on the other side of the Indiana Harbor Canal to the Calumet River in Chicago. I was curious about this short first part:



Does CSX send anything up and down this branch line? It appears very well positioned to have serviced a lot of the lake front industries northwest of Gary, but do they still have customers up this way?

BTW, found this old picture. I'm curious if this was at the spot where the Lake Sub junctions with the NS Chicago Line?



It looks like it, but there are obviously changes that have been made since this photo was taken if it is.

[SD80MAC]

That part of the Lake Subdivision (if that's what CSX technically classifies it as) serves as a connector between the NS and the Barr Sub. It is indeed a remnant of the B&OCT's passenger line into the city. Most of the CSX trains on the Barr Sub that go to and from the Belt Railway of Chicago (and maybe some other traffic, I'm not sure), like M368 and M369 to Clearing Yard, take that connection to get on the NS to go to the BRC connection at CP 509. CSX would also send coal trains to and from the BNSF via that routing sometimes, too.

[MiddleMI]

Thanks. I'd found a (crude) old map after posting that showed the original set-up. It looks like this old B&O mainline used to cross the NY Central just before the Indiana Harbor Canal, which is why it's south of it on one side and north of it on the other, now.

What a mess of lines in Lake County!

BTW, I read somewhere that the B&O continued northwest to Brookdale in Chicago, and then used Illinois Central's trackage to get to downtown Chicago. This was in the 1870s. I was curious to know when this passenger mainline became an industrial branch. It's said this happened when Illinois Central elevated its mainline, but when was that? Because after that, maps show passenger routes to downtown either being taken west on the B&OCT from Clarke Junction or over trackage rights on the Chicago, Rock Island and Pacific Railroad at South Chicago Rock Island Junction around town to get downtown.

[Typhoon]

http://industrialscenery.blogspot.com/2 ... kdale.html

[MiddleMI]

Thanks. One more question. What did Pine Tower protect? I know the B&O and B&OCT came together, here, but did the B&OCT also junction with the New York Central line? Pine Tower has it's "back" to the B&O and B&OCT junction, so it looks like it was built to project some junction between the B&O and NYC, but I've never seen a picture of a crossover, here.

Also, I've seen C&O mentioned in relation to this junction. Which line was C&O's?

[SD80MAC]

The only thing I can think of that would involve C&O at Pine were C&O trains to and from Michigan that were coming/going from the B&OCT's Barr Yard or running to the BRC's Clearing or Rockwell St Yard via the NYC. C&O's own line was farther south, joining with the Erie at Griffith.

I may be mistaken, but I believe there was a connection from the B&OCT to the NYC right at Pine interlocking, almost right under the EJ&E bridge. It was later moved a couple of miles east to its current location at East Curtis.

[MiddleMI]

I may be mistaken, but I believe there was a connection from the B&OCT to the NYC right at Pine interlocking, almost right under the EJ&E bridge. It was later moved a couple of miles east to its current location at East Curtis.

Ah, thanks. That's what I was thinking, that there must have been a connection to the NYC. I've just never seen a picture showing this connection, at least not clearly or explicitly.

[justalurker66]

Take a look at the map you posted. Just northwest of the bridge is a line between the NYC and the B&O.