Cleveland RTA: Heavy and Light Rail System

Conrail engineer is right. There are two combination high-low platform stations -- E. 34th (or whatever the present, fancier name is) and E. 55th St. High and low platform cars share the track between the Union Terminal and E. 55th,and have done so since 1955 when the present Red Line first opened. (Before that, the only rapid transit operation was the Shaker Heights Rapid Transit, which used PCCs and rebuilt older ex-Cleveland city cars.) The two lines diverge at 55th St.

If it's of any historical interest, the junction at E. 55th St. was originally built (in 1930) to be a three-way grade-separated junction for (1) the present East Side Red Line (which at that time had been graded and almost completed as far as East Cleveland), (2) the Shaker Heights line, in existence since 1920, and (3) a branch to the southeast that would connect with the interurban line to Akron. The latter spur also served the Shaker Heights shop and yard. All of this was part of the grand planning of Cleveland's Van Sweringen brothers, who built Shaker Heights, the Union Terminal, the Terminal Tower complex, and controlled the Nickel Plate, C&O, Pere Marquette, Erie, and (after 1930) the Missouri Pacific, T&P, and C&EI.

He's also right about East Side vs. West Side Cleveland. As a onetime East Sider, it was always an adventure to visit (after passing through customs, of course) that strange country west of the Cuyahoga.

drewh wrote:The old dept store (Higby's I think it was called) was closed and the store empty - it was part of the Terminal Tower project as well.

The store was called Higbee's.

I grew up in the '60s in Warren, about 50 miles away to the southeast. Whenever my parents and I drove up to Cleveland, we parked in Shaker Heights and rode the Shaker Rapid's yellow PCCs into town. We always did some shopping at Higbee's, and at the May Co., the other big department store on Public Square.

Nobody's mentioned yet that the "Rapid" originally had left-hand running between Terminal Tower and E. 55th St., so the Shaker cars could board at low-level center platforms at E. 34th and E. 55th. When the CTS and Shaker lines diverged after E. 55th, the Shaker tracks switched to right-hand running using a grade-separated flyover, but the CTS tracks stayed with left-hand running all the way out to the eastern terminal at Windermere.

The CTS tracks used a flyover at the eastern entrance to the Terminal Tower to switch to right-hand running at the Terminal Tower station and out through the West Side. The Shaker cars didn't use that flyover because they had a separate station at Terminal Tower, with a loop.

For me, of course, the West Side was the "foreign country."

When the RTA replaced the PCCs with the Breda LRVs in the 1980s, they converted the East Side Rapid to right-hand running. On my first visit to Cleveland in the late 1980s, after the changeover, I rode the Blue Line into town from Shaker Heights, and this was my first indication that major changes had taken place. "Hey, we're running on the wrong side!" Then when I got off the train at Tower City, I was completely lost. The layout of the mall is completely different from the Terminal Tower days.

BaltOhio wrote:If it's of any historical interest, the junction at E. 55th St. was originally built (in 1930) to be a three-way grade-separated junction for (1) the present East Side Red Line (which at that time had been graded and almost completed as far as East Cleveland), (2) the Shaker Heights line, in existence since 1920, and (3) a branch to the southeast that would connect with the interurban line to Akron. The latter spur also served the Shaker Heights shop and yard. All of this was part of the grand planning of Cleveland's Van Sweringen brothers, who built Shaker Heights, the Union Terminal, the Terminal Tower complex, and controlled the Nickel Plate, C&O, Pere Marquette, Erie, and (after 1930) the Missouri Pacific, T&P, and C&EI.

Good analysis BaltOhio... B/c the Van Sweringens were so secretive and mysterious, we can only attempt to glean their exact intentions by their trying to make sense of their actions... Although they seemed to be on the verge of finishing the 1st leg of the Red Line in 1930, there's some question as to how ready they were to start. They had no cars to service the line and no power source available... Ditto with the elaborate Kingsbury tunnel connection to the Akron interurban to the SE...

The Vans M.O. seemed to be to build provisions and connections for "future use" ... you can include the subway connector tunnel partly under Huron Rd. from Tower City. It seems the Vans were only interested in using rapid transit as a means to an end (promote R.E. sales in Shaker Hts) rather than an end in of itself. Once Shaker was up and running, their interests turned away from rapid transit building. The evidence? They never built/opened any other Rapid line; they never bought/built new cars, equipment for the Shaker Line and, in 1930, they barely completed the Shaker Line into Terminal Tower (well after their passenger RR trains for which, conversely, they electrified with heavy catenary, bought/built brand new engines to ferry coaches from the East & West edges of town through Union Station).

Instead, they became obsessed with RR’s though their Nickel Plate empire, and building the Terminal Tower/Union Station complex, the latter of which taxed their energy, resources and, ultimately, caused them to lose everything as they went bust in the Depression. Their collapse shows, clearly, how they’d totally leveraged – the Vans were expert in using OPM (other people’s $$$) -- their empire and when offices weren’t selling in their spanking new (probably oversized) Tower, everything collapsed.

Apparently 4 or 5 after they lost control of their empire in 1930, and desperate for Terminal Tower tenants, they tried to finish the East leg of the Red Line by quickly renting 16 mothballed interurban cars from a failed Kentucky line… But it was too late for the Vans and, of course, the Red Line would not be completed until the (then) unborn CTS finished the system along the Van’s undone rail line some 2 decades after the broke (and broken) Vans had died in frustration.

rail10 wrote:What type of signals are used for the Cleveland light and heavy rails system?

Cab signals are used on the entire Red line, and onto the Blue/Green lines east only as far as E. 79th where, at that station, drivers must stop, reach over with a skeleton key and turn the Cab on or off, depending on the direction. It's quite archaic. After that point, to the ends of the lines in Shaker Heights, the old 3-light block system is used with most old Union Signal Co. signals mainly replaced w/ new ones (although a few stil exist). The plan was to run cab signals throughout the Blue and Green lines, but it didn't prove to be cost effective, so the old system lives on...

The cab system hasn't worked out too well for the Red Line. Even though it has cut down on train-to-train accidents (it hasn't eliminated them, though, as there have been a few since its implementation), it has served to slow down service, adding a good 2 mins or more to the ends of the line after implementation.

On the newer 2.2 mile Waterfront line (of Blue/Green lines, the cab signaling ends at the 1st station, Settler's Landing, where the E.79th street awkward procedure is completed once again... My understanding is the Waterfront Line, from that point, is totally UNsignalled and that drivers are on straight visual rules. I guess that's OK w/ the ground level Waterfront service along the Cuyahoga, but when it switches to grade-separated mode, at the elevated section that curves over the NS tracks where the line runs for about a mile to the Muni Lot (South Harbor) seems a little dangerous, but there have been no accidents, to date. The Waterfront Line is feast or famine with very light 1/2 hour service practically all day where only a handful of people ride, to the dates of Browns games, where riders pack tightly-scheduled 2-car trains that drop fans off right at the stadium.

A new condo/retail/entertainment development underway at the Flats East Bank station should boost WFL ridership considerably.

Hope that helps.

^bump; any more interest in Cleveland rail transit?

I personally find Cleveland's transit interesting, but really don't think anything on the rail side will happen in soon. There's just no growth. But it is the only system in the US operating full overhead catenary high-level transit interlined with LRT transit. It is a weird mix of interesting technologies that represent what the US engineers can come up with when let loose to experiment.

Going back to the mystery of the original Red Line between CUT and East Cleveland: The Vans had the line almost complete. One track had been laid at least as far as Cedar Glen station (now Cedar-Univ.), and more rail and ties were on hand when work stopped in 1930. But Pulley4 is right in that no cars were ever formally ordered, although I understand that plans and specs were put together. I think the problem was, who would operate it? As I recall, by then the Vans had working control of the Cleveland Ry., and had intended them to be the operator, but the CRy resisted, and things fell apart before anything further could be done. As I recall, too, the almost-complete Red Line ROW ended up in the hands of the Nickel Plate, and probably was on NKP property from the beginning.

I'm not sure the Vans ever lost interest in rapid transit. The had grand plans for a full-scale system in Cleveland, with lines to Rocky River, to the SW, and various other lines. And one can still see the relics of the grandiose rapid transit/superhighway route from Green Rd. to Mayfield via Shaker and Gates Mills Blvd. to serve their new (and, of course, aborted) "Shaker Country Estates" development. There were vague plans to extend this line to Gates Mills via the old C&E right of way, as well as extending what is now the Van Aken Line to Chagrin Falls on the C&CF route and to Northfield. Yeah, they were in that game to the end and, unfortunately, didn't know when to stop.

gt7348b wrote:I personally find Cleveland's transit interesting, but really don't think anything on the rail side will happen in soon. There's just no growth. But it is the only system in the US operating full overhead catenary high-level transit interlined with LRT transit. It is a weird mix of interesting technologies that represent what the US engineers can come up with when let loose to experiment.

With regard to rail rapid transit you might be right, although there is a long term plan to extend rail east (and possibly west) from the Waterfront LRT along the lakeshore. However, there are some interesting transit projects underway:

-- The Euclid Corridor BRT is about in the final building stages from Public Square to Windermere along the core Euclid Ave. corridor.

-- the West Shore Commuter Rail project has been approved for a $300K+ planning grant to establish commuter rail from Cleveland west to Lorain and Vermilion (and possibly seasonally further west to Sandusky/Cedar Point amusement mega-park) along the old, lightly-used NS tracks either temporarily stopping at (for transfer) or possibly utilizing RTA's Red Line rapid transit tracks-- see the website for the private/grassroots group All Aboard Ohio (AA0) whch is corridinating this: http://www.allaboardohio.org/cms/index.php
http://www.urbanohio.com/forum2/index.p ... 1.450.html

-- AAO's largest program is also coordinating planning for the Amtrak Ohio Hub initiative which would establish conventional diesel service on rebuilt tracks (for up to 125 MPH) for 2 regional routes (Cincinnati-to-Toronto via Buffalo; Detroit-to-Pittsburgh with Cleveland has the crisscrossing hub for both lines. There’s planned a station next to Cleveland Hopkins airport (and the Red Line) as well as commuter services as well.

-- There’s planning for the 50-mile, tourist-oriented Cuyahoga Valley Scenic Railroad (CVSR) to be extended 8 miles north into downtown Cleveland (from Valley View) and upgrading it to commuter rail, connecting Cleveland, Akron and Canton (serving University of Akron, the new Steelyards Commons shopping center in the Cleveland Flats, Canton-Akron Regional Airport and Tower City in Cleveland (which, of course, would connect directly to the Rapid transit hub).
http://www.urbanohio.com/forum2/index.p ... 699.0.html

-- Several major TOD programs tied to the Rapid are either in advanced planning and/or soon to be underway, like the Flats East Bank mega condo/apt/hotel/office/supper market/theatre/bookstore/hotel/office complex all built adjacent to RTA’s Waterfront LRT line…
http://www.urbanohio.com/forum2/index.p ... 823.0.html


So I’d say there’s quite a bit going on for this medium-sized, allegedly Rust Belt metro city that is neither in the NEC or a Chicago satellite. For a city losing population yet hanging in there, obviously, I’d say Cleveland’s a rather feisty town, transit-wise.

BaltOhio wrote:Going back to the mystery of the original Red Line between CUT and East Cleveland: The Vans had the line almost complete. One track had been laid at least as far as Cedar Glen station (now Cedar-Univ.), and more rail and ties were on hand when work stopped in 1930. But Pulley4 is right in that no cars were ever formally ordered, although I understand that plans and specs were put together. I think the problem was, who would operate it? As I recall, by then the Vans had working control of the Cleveland Ry., and had intended them to be the operator, but the CRy resisted, and things fell apart before anything further could be done. As I recall, too, the almost-complete Red Line ROW ended up in the hands of the Nickel Plate, and probably was on NKP property from the beginning.

I'm not sure the Vans ever lost interest in rapid transit. The had grand plans for a full-scale system in Cleveland, with lines to Rocky River, to the SW, and various other lines. And one can still see the relics of the grandiose rapid transit/superhighway route from Green Rd. to Mayfield via Shaker and Gates Mills Blvd. to serve their new (and, of course, aborted) "Shaker Country Estates" development. There were vague plans to extend this line to Gates Mills via the old C&E right of way, as well as extending what is now the Van Aken Line to Chagrin Falls on the C&CF route and to Northfield. Yeah, they were in that game to the end and, unfortunately, didn't know when to stop.

I think you're right on, BaltOhio, there was no one to operate such a line. But here's were I slightly differ -- yes, the Vans released plans (and I stress plans) for a loft, vast rapid transit network that the newspapers ate up (I recall one, printed I recall when the Terminal Tower open, proclaimed plans for: rapid transit up toe 60 miles away!)... What some historians speculate, and I agree, is that the Vans were counting on interurbans running and, in part, helping build connections to the rapid ROW to help speed trains from outlying areas into the centralized, off-street rapid transit terminal...

Unfortunately, it appears there early aspects of the auto age caught up with the Vans while their decade-long building of Terminal Tower took place; most interurbans went belly-up during this period... And yet, even the Chagrin Falls line (where the rapid was planned to go) interfaced and yet never connected to the Van Aken (then Moreland) rapid terminal, and died in 1925. As you know, the recently bricked-up Kingsbury Tunnels where the Red and Blue/Green lines split, was built (around 1929) for a 3-way, grade separated junction for the 2 now-existing Rapids and a connection to a southeastern line, probably connecting the old A-B-C interurban line (so named for connecting Akron, Bedford and Cleveland). But the connection was never made, and ABC was abandoned in 1932, 2 years after the Shaker Rapid entered TT.

So I think, BaltOhio, the Vans got ahead of themselves – actually began building a rapid line with no one to run it; definitely not their M.O. – the Shaker line was run by a holding company after the tremendous Van (borrowed) expense used to build it …The East Cleveland ROW was, I think, built by the Vans Union Terminals (note the plural) holding company that electrified the aforementioned Linndale-to-Collinwood shuttle necessary for thru passenger traffic connecting the underground TT/Union Station. But like you said, once the EC Rapid was almost finished, the Vans apparently decided to halt work -- in large part b/c their empire was collapsing due to poor TT office rentals due to the 1929 stock market crash -- and also because there was no interurban or other company to run it (the notoriously cheap Cleveland Railway, which the Vans bought temporarily as a holding co. but forced to release) apparently had no interest in running a rapid during hard times...

And yet, as noted, in apparent act of desperation, the Vans decided to buy the 10, 2nd-hand KY interurban cars and run a small line themselves, hoping it would grow like the Shaker (which started in 1920 with 4 rented CR cars operating every hour) service into profitability.

... we may never know for certain what happened, but that's my best guess.

OK Pulley4, you asked for it. Brace yourself for some truly eye-glazing corporate stuff, which I defy any sane person to follow.

There's a lot of misunderstanding about the Vans' corporate structures, much of which they intentionally fostered. Furthermore, nothing in the Van Sweringen world stayed put for very long, so projects and the corporate entities financing them were constantly in flux. (O. P. Van Sweringen was even changing the physical aspects of the CUT/Terminal Tower project as it was being built.)

But let's take the situation as it was in, say, 1930, when CUT was completed. These were some of the relevant companies associated with CUT, the Terminal building complex, and the rapid transit lines:

Cleveland Union Terminals Co.: There was no Van Sweringen financial interest in this whatever. This was a classic case of how the Vans got somebody else to pay for the underpinnings of their own more lucrative real estate projects. The CUT Co. was wholly railroad-owned, 93% by the NYC and its Big Four subsidiary and 7% by the Nickel Plate. Actual financing was done largely through bonds sold to outsiders and guaranteed by the railroads. Even so, the Vans rigged things so that they would have full control over the construction of the facility, turning it over to the railroads only after completion.

Furthermore, CUT's actual property was quite limited in scope. CUT-owned right-of-way started on the west at the NKP interchange west of W. 25th St. and extended east only to about E. 37th St, where it again interchanged with the NKP. Everything beyond those limits was owned (including the electrification and other CUT-related improvements) and paid for by the NYC, Big Four, and NKP. Between E. 37th St. and East Cleveland, NYC's CUT access was over what had been NKP property. Between a point west of W. 25th St. and Linndale it was on Big Four property. East Cleveland station was jointly built and owned by NYC and NKP; Linndale station was built by the Big Four.

The Terminal Tower and other buildings in the Terminal complex (originally the Hotel Cleveland, Midland Building, Guildhall Building, and Medical Arts Building, plus others planned) were directly owned by the Vans through several Van Sweringen holding and operating companies, none of which had any corporate relationship to the CUT Co. Their properties were leased from the CUT Co. through an air-rights agreements which, not surprisingly, were very favorable to the Vans.

Which now gets us to the rapid transit projects. I can't document this, but I strongly believe that the present Red Line construction east of E. 55th St. was paid for by the NKP as an interim arrangement pending eventual sale or lease to a transit operator --presumably the Cleveland Ry.

That, in turn, gets us to the ownership of the various transit properties as it was in 1930:

As part of their takeover of the Cleveland Ry. in 1929, the Vans set up an umbrella holding company called Metropolitan Utilities to control all their transit properties. Besides the Cleveland Ry., these included the Cleveland & Youngstown RR (which owned the Shaker Heights line's property), the Cleveland Interurban RR (which operated it), and the Cleveland Traction Terminals Co., which was to lease the traction facilities within the Union Terminal. Most likely, the long-term idea was to consolidate all the rapid transit and city streetcar operations under a single operating entity. In the meantime, those KT&T lightweights were actually bought (in 1934) by the Cleveland Interurban, probably as another expedient "interim" arrangement until everything could be put together. (It all became academic in 1935 when the banks took over Metropolitan Utilities.)

Got all that? I'm not sure whether I've enlightened anyone here, but in any event that's how it was all done -- or was hoped to be done.

BRAVO BaltOhio, that's an outstanding recitation and very educational in such a short space. Obviously, you know your stuff... You laid out in detail what my layman mind can grasp: the Vans were the kings of OPM which, of course, bit 'em in the butt in the end leading to the collapse of their empire.

QUERY: from 1929 (E. Cleveland Line building by NKP) to 1934, when the KY cars were bought, why were the Vans so slow?

Also, as a held company by the Vans, why was CR so reluctant to run the East Cleveland line? ... unless CR had autonomy or, perhaps, the unraveling of the Van empire was well underway by the Terminal's opening where CR could read the tea leaves.

I sometimes wonder what may have been had the Vans actually got the E. Cleve rapid transit running in the 1930s. What would Cleveland have today? Your thoughts? Anybody?

The Vans were slow because the stock market crash of 1929 wiped them out. They liquidated their holdings to pay off debts and were, essentially, penniless when M.P died in 1935. Apparently he was the driving force of the two because O.P. essentially drifted before dying a year and a half later, with total assets of about $3000.

Nothing was done during that time because there was no private money; the WPA administrators had other priorities; and the war effort of the 1940s steered resources elsewhere. It was only in the 1950s when the economy began to expand in earnest.

I'll try to comment as best I can to both Pulley4 and conrail:

First off, conrail is right in that when the Depression hit, the Vans had so many problems keeping their empire intact that rapid transit was way down on the list. Remember that they had financed everything -- railroad acquisitions, all real estate projects, and whatall -- through what would now be called highly leveraged financing. They needed dividends from all the operating companies to pay the preferred dividends and bond interest necessary to keep things financially afloat. Railroad revenue and real estate both went down the tubes. The only thing that partly kept them going was the C&O which, thanks to its very profitable coal traffic, could keep pumping some dividends into the structure. The MoPac, which had been acquired at a premium price in 1929-30, went bankrupt in 1933, as did the C&EI.

Yet despite everything, they managed to hold things together, in part because, like the present "subprime crisis", they were financially too big to be allowed to go under, as their creditor banks realized. But in 1935 a loan from J. P. Morgan & Co. came due and Morgan had to throw in the towel and put their properties up for auction. Miraculously, though, they still kept their control (over the railroads, at least) by working out a "friendly" takeover by George Ball (of the Ball jar fortune) and George Tomlinson , a Cleveland lakes steamship operator. So they stayed in business, more or less, until O. P. Van Sweringen died in 1936.

Conrail has it backward, though, about the brothers. M. J. was essentially a glorified clerk, an intelligent but earthbound man whose main job was to pick up after his genius brother and translate the rather aloof O. P.'s ideas to the staff. O. P. was very bright and creative. He was the one with all the ideas, and created the means to push them through. But at the same time he was a strange combination of an aggressive but very shy personality. He dominated his brother and his associates, but hated even to be seen in public, never gave speeches (but was very articulate with bankers and politicians), and never wanted any form of publicity (except where he could manipulate public opinion, as in the early civic controversy over the lakefront vs. Public Square union station location). His greatest weakness -- which proved to be his undoing -- was that he was invariably optimistic, and expanded his projects (eg, the Missouri Pacific, Shaker Country Estates) at exactly the wrong time. Even the night before he died -- which happened to be on an NKP-Lackawanna train to New York -- he was planning where else to expand once the Depression was over. (And, ironically, by then his empire was beginning to recover.)

But both of those guys were enigmas to the end.

I suppose I should mention that I've spent time in both O. P.'s and M. J.'s old private offices on the 36th floor of the Terminal Tower, as well as the Vans' set of private suites on the 12th floor -- although I can't say I always enjoyed the experiences. My boss was in O. P.'s office and C&O/Chessie System's president was in M. J.'s. (The two offices interconnected.) Almost always, I had to give some little recitation and be quizzed on it, and the officers' luncheons in the suite were nothing if not ulcer-producing. But it was nice to be able to absorb some of the (very) conservative splendor that the Vans surrounded themselves with.

Yes, I'm obviously aware the Depression had a big reason for stopping development of the E. Cleve rapid in its tracks, but (BaltOhio) you've given me great insight why/how, 5 years into the Depression, the Vans still had enough juice, and audacity to some degree, to by the KY cars and try to get the operation going.

I use audacity because, with any visionary builder of such epic proportions as OP Van Sweringen, there seems a degree of self-deluding dreaminess and reckless naiveté to the potential dangers of immediate situation that is, almost necessary, for one to reach her/his level of success to begin with. I know that's kind of wordy and convoluted, but I hope you understand my point. If he were a cautious, conservative OP, there likely would never have been a Shaker Heights, or Terminal Group or rapid transit... Somewhere I read the Vans (presumably OP) once opined the "new" Lorain-Carnegie Bridge be built directly into Terminal complex -- I guess a true dreamer should never dream small.

BTW, was the East Cleveland line always conceived to be high platform from the beginning? Thus, were the original CTS Rapid platforms in Terminal Tower, in use from 1955 until the Tower City makeover of 1989, the original ones built by the Vans? It would make sense since the Shaker and Cleveland stations appear to have been physically segregated from the beginning. … or could the new line been projected as a high/low line since the 2 projected (and eventual) shared stations at E. 34th & E. 55th do not appear to have been altered by the Vans to accommodate the new service?.

To get back to the East Cleveland rapid transit planning:

The line was designed for high-platform equipment, and the high-level platforms in CUT were there from the beginning. In fact, the plan was also to convert the Shaker line to high-level.

It's been years since I've been in Cleveland, and I imagine everything has now been rebuilt, but the Shaker used a minimal little wood station at E. 55th St. that was oddly elevated from track level -- you used a flight of stairs to get to & from the street, then another short flight from station to tracks. Obviously it was planned as a high-level station, austere and temporary as it was. I think E. 34th was the same, but don't remember.

East of E. 55th, there were several almost-completed stations with stairways that clearly were meant to serve high-level platforms, Cedar Glen being one.

I'm told that drawings existed in the old Shaker Kingsbury Run shop office that showed the planned equipment as very similar to (but shorter than ) the Illinois Central's suburban cars, which were contemporary at the time. The KT&T cars obviously were acquired as yet another temporary stopgap (as, in fact, were the Cleveland Ry. 1200s that formed the original Shaker fleet), and had no relationship to what the Vans had really intended.

The original CUT "traction" facilities included two separate concourses flanking the main "steam" concourse that were intended strictly for rapid transit and interurban use. To the east of the high-level platforms were several stairways leading to unfinished platforms meant to serve the interurban lines. The Shaker line "temporarily" used the pair of these closest to the high-level facilities for most of its life -- maybe still does -- but beyond those were additional ghost platforms that never saw a train. Also, at the east/north ends of the two traction concourses was an underground passageway that connected them. The idea of this was that it would lead to a planned underground terminal for the city streetcars lines to be located underneath the Public Square.

Indeed, if you explored CUT before the shopping mall butchered it all, you could see all sorts of ghosts of the Vans' dreams.