Concrete phone booth

[NYCRRson]

I can recall being in the crossing watchman shanty at Dewey Avenue in about 1960 or so. It was no longer in use but a couple kids I knew had popped the lock (and replaced it with one of their own! ).

Sure sounds like BR&P hung out with a "bad crowd"..... Maybe he "popped the lock" ???

My Dad told of shimming up the trolley line poles (the "high speed" line from Buffalo to Niagara Falls which had poles on both sides of the ROW to support the "wire") and stringing a rope across the ROW so when the trolley arrived the rope pulled the trolley pole off the wire.... Lots of hilarity ensued with delayed customers, and trolley men chasing incorrigible youths down the streets to deliver a "whooping" if they managed to catch them....

Cheers, Kevin

[BR&P]

No, while I don't claim to be a shining citizen back then, it really was a couple older guys involved in this particular instance.

At the risk of drifting off topic, I WAS involved with a few other escapades. One which comes to mind was riding a boxcar headed south in the Second Belt one night. It was an empty which had carried bricks to Miller Brick at Little Ridge Team Track. At that time bricks were shipped with large quantities of straw or hay as dunnage, to cushion the jolts of travel. So here's all this hay, and one of us...don't ask who...came up with the idea of piling it all up in the doorway.

As the car rumbled across Ridgeway Avenue, one of us was just out of sight on each side of the door, and we kicked all that stuff into the highway. I know, at this age it sounds foolish, but I assure you it was funny as hell at the time!

After riding the train up to Lexington or Emerson Street, we walked back toward home - and at the crossing, cars were STILL slowing down and picking their way around and through the piles!

[ACM]

A concrete phone booth currently stands along the Dock Branch of the B&O (which is now a hiking trail) behind a house on Burley Road. While exploring the booth one Sunday morning in March the female owner of the property loudly reminded me from her house that I was trespassing on private property.

[BR&P]

That location was known as Feldspar Junction.

[sd80mac]

A concrete phone booth currently stands along the Dock Branch of the B&O (which is now a hiking trail) behind a house on Burley Road. While exploring the booth one Sunday morning in March the female owner of the property loudly reminded me from her house that I was trespassing on private property.

Is this one?

[nydepot]

You weren't on their property. Note the line is up by the sheds.

lots.JPG

[BR&P]

That's not where the phone booth is. Follow the Dock Branch east till it curves north. In this view, it's somewhere roughly by the word "Genesee" in "Genesee Riverway Trail". It is on the inside of the curve - to the west/north of where the tracks were.

https://www.google.com/maps/@43.2224678 ... a=!3m1!1e3" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[nydepot]

Which view are you talking about? The first view it's circled because he was onsite. The second view is the same place with lot lines. Are you saying sd80mac saw a different concrete object?

[BR&P]

OK, the old guy tried to put 3 pics on the same reply and wound up with them repeating each time etc. So 3 separate posts, if you don't mind.

Feldspar Junction. Here's where the phone booth was before abandonment. View is roughly southwest. Track at far left went down the hill to the ferry slip, and to the bottom of the empty trestle. Beyond the crossover, the tracks were, left to right, Main, Old Main, Riverside 1 and Riverside 2. Following those tracks around the bend would lead you to the Lake Avenue overpass. The track at lower right was the Dock Main going up toward the office, and the switch and track closer to the camera was Dock Yard 6.

Here's where the phone booth was before abandonment. View is roughly southwest. Track at far left went down the hill to the ferry slip, and to the bottom of the empty trestle. Beyond the crossover, the tracks were, left to right, Main, Old Main, Riverside 1 and Riverside 2. Following those tracks around the bend would lead you to the Lake Avenue overpass. The track at lower right was the Dock Main going up toward the office, and the switch and track closer to the camera was Dock Yard 6.

img788.jpg (365.63 KiB) Viewed 3543 times

[BR&P]

Photo from on top of that phone booth looking about north. From left, Dock Main, Dock Yard 4, 5 and 6, and the track going down the hill.

img789.jpg (331.06 KiB) Viewed 3543 times

[BR&P]

A different phone booth, this one at Dock Junction, view more or less north. At far left was Upper Long, then the Main,then Stone Road siding. At the bottom of the photo, the left track was the Main with Dewey Avenue about 1/2 or 3/4 mile behind, the right track which the pic was taken from the middle of was the Dock Main. About 5 carlengths behind the camera on THAT track was the bridge where the Dock Branch crossed over the NYC Charlotte Branch.

img790.jpg (342.37 KiB) Viewed 3543 times

[BR&P]

Which view are you talking about? The first view it's circled because he was onsite. The second view is the same place with lot lines. Are you saying sd80mac saw a different concrete object?

The zigzag in the trail and the road at top left (Lake Ave) shows this view is almost where the tracks went under Lake Ave. This is perhaps 60 or 70 carlengths away from Feldspar Jct, and from where the phone booth used to be. Maybe it got moved up there, I don't know. About 2 years ago I walked the trail with Charlie6017 and at that time the booth was still right at Feldspar Jct but had been moved closer to the houses. If the orange circle is the booth that was the one referenced in my first 2 pics, it's a fairly recent move.

[sd80mac]

Which view are you talking about? The first view it's circled because he was onsite. The second view is the same place with lot lines. Are you saying sd80mac saw a different concrete object?

Onsite? not me... It was ACM. and s/he hasn't answered to my question. I only asked "Is this it?"

[ACM]

The orange circle is not the site of the existing phone booth. If you go to the map on your device, follow Burley Road from Lake Avenue to the cul de sac. At about 2 o'clock is a house with a large above ground pool. Almost directly northeast of the pool is the existing booth. It seems as if that could be its original location.

[BR&P]

Everything looks so different than it did back then. At the time I walked the trail a couple years ago, it seemed to me the booth had been moved farther back from where it had been located. Maybe when they were smoothing out the trail, they were going to destroy it and a homeowner arranged for it to be moved to his/her yard, I don't know. But as you can see from the pics, it originally sat right next to the tracks.