Freight lines in Philadelphia

Hello all

I was out and about in Philadelphia yesterday, being one of my first few days in the United States, from overseas. I was walking up a street which crosses the river adjacent to 30th Street station, and on the other side of the river from 30th, I noticed two freight lines down below, with a CSX freighter passing underneath.

I'm curious to know what this line is, if there are other freight lines in Philadelphia and their frequency of traffic. Even though I'm mainly going after passenger trains while visiting the US, I wouldn't mind getting a few photos here and there of freight operations in the immediate Philadelphia area.


Thanks!

That's currently CSX's Philadelphia division, formerly B&O Railroad. They also own the freight trestle along and above 31st street. They both have fairly frequent traffic but it's hit or miss...sometimes you'll see 6 trains in an hour and sometimes none for 3. The lines along the river head south to some large yards in South Philadelphia and runs roughly parallel to Amtrak's NEC beyond Philly to Baltimore. North, I believe it connects to an ex-Reading Railroad line heading towards Trenton.

Plenty of Freight Lines in Philadelphia (albiet nowhere as busy as in the 1960s...)

Anyway, there's a decent amount of activity in Northeast Philadelphia; Port Richmond, Reading Short Line, Frankford Junction (a fan favorite), even the Bustleton Branch.

There are several threads upon this topic, here's one to start:

http://www.railroad.net/forums/viewtopic.php?t=26449