Delaware and Raritan River Railroad-General Discussion

Correction to an earlier statement.

Once Farmingdale to Freehold is open two coast line freights will remain.

The transfer to browns and whoever works CUTTERS siding in Woodbridge.

Bracdude181 wrote: ↑Sat May 06, 2023 1:15 pm Correction to an earlier statement.

Once Farmingdale to Freehold is open two coast line freights will remain.

The transfer to browns and whoever works CUTTERS siding in Woodbridge.

Thanks. So it's one existing daily freight train removed from the NJCL. Hardly seems like an epic decongestion move.

No, but there are benefits.

Customers on the Southern will pay less NJT fees. C&D gets to service the whole network with one train instead of 2, etc.

Its not just a question of getting one RT freigt off the NYLB SA to Redbank and back.,.....NJT is run (as far as I can tell) by politicians who see freight as a liability and want it off their rails as much as possible.

Also one less job, twice a week as far as CSAO is concerned, and better for C&D...both lines connected, and one interchange point directly with CSAO. And possibly 286K max car weights and Plate F on the C&D.

Plate F can only come in via Monmouth Junction and I’m not 100 sure what’ll happen to SA31 after the connection opens.

jdh823 wrote: ↑Fri May 05, 2023 6:05 pm https://newjersey.news12.com/freehold-n ... ain-future

An uncertain future for a potential c&d customer...

Won't be shocked if they leave. For starters, NJ is not very business (especially industrial) friendly, and second, as mentioned in that article, the facility is quite old, probably not as big as they want it to be, and there's no chance that they can expand the plant without spending more money than they should, when they could maybe go an hour west to PA and build a new plant for much cheaper.

If they stay, I'd be shocked if they get rail service again. I hope they stay, going through Freehold and smelling coffee was a very pleasant experience growing up and to this day.

Bracdude181 wrote: ↑Fri May 05, 2023 6:13 pm Ties have been laid up until where the red vehicle on the left is sitting. A friend mentioned the recent rainstorms caused some flooding here…

Seems like all is well railroad-wise in those areas despite the storm, thankfully. Railroads and their ROW are not very well-known for good drainage.

Dcell wrote: ↑Sat May 06, 2023 4:50 pm Thanks. So it's one existing daily freight train removed from the NJCL. Hardly seems like an epic decongestion move.

It's really not. Kind of hard for me to believe that the State of NJ has spent a few million dollars on this project; I'm sure as hell not saying I don't support this project 100%, but honestly from a financial sense, kind of a bit wild that ~10 million dollars of state money was spent to take one train off of the Coastline for only a couple of customers.

Unless there is something big freight-wise in the shadows waiting for this connection to be done - maybe something that will generate a lot of traffic and revenue for local businesses? Once customers on the Southern have access to 286k lb cars, and when the new Raritan River Bridge is done and can handle Plate F (286k lb cars + very tall), lots of potential.

Bracdude181 wrote: ↑Sat May 06, 2023 5:00 pm No, but there are benefits.

Customers on the Southern will pay less NJT fees. C&D gets to service the whole network with one train instead of 2, etc.

I won't be shocked if they continue to do 2 trains or something. When the FIT and SOUS are re-connected, servicing the businesses on the FIT and then having to go all the way down to Lakewood and back is going to be quite the journey, and I believe C&D crews have a max sign-on time of 8-ish hours from previous instances. Back in October, one of the engines on the SOUS broke down at Woodhaven, it took them 4-ish hours to fix it, which obviously increased the jobtime. At 8 hours they were just at about Collingwood Auction, where they parked the train with the empties until sometime a few days later. There's a video of said train on my channel here

pdtrains wrote: ↑Sat May 06, 2023 7:30 pm Its not just a question of getting one RT freigt off the NYLB SA to Redbank and back.,.....NJT is run (as far as I can tell) by politicians who see freight as a liability and want it off their rails as much as possible.

Also one less job, twice a week as far as CSAO is concerned, and better for C&D...both lines connected, and one interchange point directly with CSAO. And possibly 286K max car weights and Plate F on the C&D.

For now, only 286k lb cars will be able to be used after the project is complete. Plate F will be able to come down here once the new Raritan River Bridge is built. Until then, Plate F can come off of Amtrak at Monmouth Junction, but I don't think I have heard of many times where freight came off of the NEC from there.

Plate F is unable to come in through the normal interchange even with the new bridge due to many low bridges in Perth Amboy. Maximum height is Plate E and Plate E is REALLY pushing it.

https://www.njtpa.org/NJTPA/media/Docum ... f?ext=.pdf

JohnFromJersey wrote: ↑Sat May 06, 2023 10:40 pm For now, only 286k lb cars will be able to be used after the project is complete. Until then, Plate F can come off of Amtrak at Monmouth Junction, but I don't think I have heard of many times where freight came off of the NEC from there.

CSAO would need to cross over three tracks plus a reverse move to access Monmouth Junction from Oak Island. In this situation, might be simpler to have inbound carloads via Morrisville on NS instead.

The majority of Browns Traffic (at least 80 percent) comes in on CSX. Mainly CSX M433 which comes out of Selkirk NY. Coming in that way would mean a deviation down to Woodbourne to go back up to MJ via Morrisvile.

It’s been mentioned by others here previously that Plate F traffic to Browns does come in through MJ once in a blue moon, but I think its only when someone in Dayton needs a Plate F boxcar.

IMO the max car weights are a bigger problem than Plate F. Most newer cars are Plate C anyways.

Bracdude181 wrote: ↑Sun May 07, 2023 9:24 pm IMO the max car weights are a bigger problem than Plate F. Most newer cars are Plate C anyways.

Well, true in that most covered hoppers, gondolas, tank cars, bulkhead flats, etc. are Plate C, but I believe most post 1990s Boxcars (and Refrigerator cars as well) are Plate F's .
Autoracks and double stack IMs are mostly plate H IIRC, but would these ever travel on the D&R (Southern/FIT)?

Plate H will probably never come down the Southern. The Coastline's catenary will probably be able to handle Plate F, but Plate H is significantly taller than Plate F. I'm not even sure if the Northeast Corridor can handle Plate H cars, I could be wrong.

Well cars can still come down, given that they are not double-stacked.

Plate F would be a nice option to have for customers along the Southern, but for the most part, it seems like all current and potential customers on the line only require Plate C's. As Bracdude181 said, the weight limit is a bigger issue for the Southern, since there are a few bridges between South Amboy and Red Bank that have a weight limit of 263k lbs, when the industry standard for freight demands 286k lbs.

Once FIT-SOUS is connected, iirc, there will be no more weight restrictions to worry about

7 for Woodhaven today. 5 lumber, two sheet rock.

Northbound at DCS LAKEWOOD 11:37 AM

Train got held up in Lakewood due to a group of people attempting to vandalize the tracks.

Approaching Victory Road 12:03 PM

What were they doing to the tracks?