I just have a few questions about the Western New York and Pennsylvania"s buffalo line from Machias Jct to Driftwood (or North Driftwood). How many trains a day or week does the WNY&P run between those two points, and when they do.....when generally is a good time to catch them. What times do they run them through and when are good times to catch them. Not sure if WNY&P goes by first or second trick operators or just one crew per day. Also, how much interchange do they have with NS and B&P at those areas specifically driftwood, olean, and machias and what are they primarily interchanging. Finally, what is the status of the signals along the line. I know B&P uses them from buffalo to machias and NS uses them from driftwood south to renovo, but all day today i noticed that not one set of signals was on today. Why is that? How much stuff is interchanging between NS and B&P at driftwood. Seems to me that it would make much more sense for WNY&P operations to be extended all the way to renovo. That is unless NS has a lot of interchange with the B&P at driftwood
First off, let's talk schedules. There is no single train that runs the entire section of the Buffalo Line that WNYP owns. The line to machias is strictly as-needed service. I'm not sure if there are actually customers there, or if it is just interchange with B&P. There are two trains you will see on the Olean-Driftwood section. DFT, the Driftwood Turn, generally runs 6 days a week (last I knew, not positive on that) to Driftwood and back with 3-4 big 6 Axle Alcos. He leaves Olean in the early afternoon, and returns in darkness. It usually hits darkness around Port Allegany area going north. The other train is the local that goes south to Larabee and then off onto the Farmers Valley branch, OL-2 I believe. I'm not sure when that runs, but I think it is on some kind of schedule. I think it also works Port Allegany. Hope this helps!
Charlie Wood