Centre Street Bridge in Newark

[Joseph DeLuisi]

There was a siding on the Centre St Branch near Sopur Bros.Trucking And Rigging, I used to see tank cars there late Eighties-Early Nineties. Also I believe Heinz was a rail customer. So when Morristown & Erie interchanges with CSX don't they traverse the section of track west of Frank Rogers Blvd?

[bk77]

There was a siding on the Centre St Branch near Sopur Bros.Trucking And Rigging, I used to see tank cars there late Eighties-Early Nineties. Also I believe Heinz was a rail customer. So when Morristown & Erie interchanges with CSX don't they traverse the section of track west of Frank Rogers Blvd?

The M&E had been interchanging the CSX traffic on the run around just east of Frank Rogers Blvd., however last time I was down there the run around looked quite overgrown. There are no longer any online customers west of the crossing, so it appears the Centre St. branch in Harrison is now completely dead.

One interesting industry in Harrison was a tank farm along the river and next to the Red Bull Arena that Conrail served many moons ago. They accessed it by coming off the eastern part of the Centre St. Branch in South Kearny, running over NJT for a bit towards the yard in Harrison, splitting off and crossing PATH at grade (the diamonds have since been removed), street ran down PATH's driveway with the tank facility just beyond. Not much of this can be seen from public property, but you can see it all on google satellite.

[rr503]

How much traffic is M&E even doing anymore? I'd be surprised if, even if they did have CSX interchange loads, they were running down more than a few times a month.

Re: old industries in Harrison, check out these maps:

http://www.multimodalways.org/docs/rail ... f#page=274
https://www.historicaerials.com/locatio ... 38/1970/16

These give an excellent sense of what was once there. Fascinating stuff.

[Joseph DeLuisi]

Thanks for answering my questions.

[bk77]

How much traffic is M&E even doing anymore? I'd be surprised if, even if they did have CSX interchange loads, they were running down more than a few times a month.

Re: old industries in Harrison, check out these maps:

http://www.multimodalways.org/docs/rail ... f#page=274
https://www.historicaerials.com/locatio ... 38/1970/16

These give an excellent sense of what was once there. Fascinating stuff.

M&E only has their Whippany line now, which last I knew only had a few customers consisting of Anderol (formerly Royal Lubricants) in East Hanover, B&G Foods at the end of the line in Roseland, and I think they still trans load biodiesel at their small yard in Cedar Knolls. I believe these customers get their cars via NS at Lake Junction, so M&E may very well not go to Harrison to interchange freight with CSAO/CSX anymore (only my guess).

BTW, Thank you for posting that map and aerial view of Harrison from way back. Fascinating stuff indeed! Today you could never tell most of that industrial track existed back then.

[rr503]

M&E only has their Whippany line now, which last I knew only had a few customers consisting of Anderol (formerly Royal Lubricants) in East Hanover, B&G Foods at the end of the line in Roseland, and I think they still trans load biodiesel at their small yard in Cedar Knolls. I believe these customers get their cars via NS at Lake Junction, so M&E may very well not go to Harrison to interchange freight with CSAO/CSX anymore (only my guess).

BTW, Thank you for posting that map and aerial view of Harrison from way back. Fascinating stuff indeed! Today you could never tell most of that industrial track existed back then.

A shame to hear that on the M&E. D&DR lines aside, they seemed to be investing a lot in additional transload capacity on the Whippany line. Out of curiosity, which _was_ the customer who sent cars to CSX? I have a vague memory of seeing centerbeams and tank cars heading down that way, but cannot remember who they were from.

Those old ZTS maps are true gems, and are so saddening. It's one thing to see big changes in areas that have become residential like Hoboken, but if you browse through those maps of industry locations you'll find countless examples of facilities that exist today that used to have rail svc.

[bk77]

M&E only has their Whippany line now, which last I knew only had a few customers consisting of Anderol (formerly Royal Lubricants) in East Hanover, B&G Foods at the end of the line in Roseland, and I think they still trans load biodiesel at their small yard in Cedar Knolls. I believe these customers get their cars via NS at Lake Junction, so M&E may very well not go to Harrison to interchange freight with CSAO/CSX anymore (only my guess).

BTW, Thank you for posting that map and aerial view of Harrison from way back. Fascinating stuff indeed! Today you could never tell most of that industrial track existed back then.

A shame to hear that on the M&E. D&DR lines aside, they seemed to be investing a lot in additional transload capacity on the Whippany line. Out of curiosity, which _was_ the customer who sent cars to CSX? I have a vague memory of seeing centerbeams and tank cars heading down that way, but cannot remember who they were from.

Those old ZTS maps are true gems, and are so saddening. It's one thing to see big changes in areas that have become residential like Hoboken, but if you browse through those maps of industry locations you'll find countless examples of facilities that exist today that used to have rail svc.

The lumber that Kuiken Bros. got in Succasanna came through Harrison (now a D&DR customer). The tank cars that M&E were storing also came through Harrison.... I remember seeing videos on these overnight M&E tank car moves over NJT on youtube. I also believe I read back then that these tank cars were gas loads being stored for Bayway (now switched by a Wabtec company). There may have been other traffic that came through Harrison for other M&E cosignee's, but I'm not sure who they would have been. So while I'm not 100% sure if the M&E interchanges with CSAO/CSX down in Harrison anymore, it does appear most or all of the stuff they were interchanging down there were for customers they no longer have.