Middletown & New Jersey Railroad: News, Operations, Updates

I read that the ethanol plant in Orange County should be started sometime in 2008. We will see what happens.

joshuahouse wrote:When the rehab starts will they bring in a contractor or do it in house?

They don't have the manpower of equipment to do the job in house. Most of their minor tie replacements were / are done by hand the old fashioned way. You can't rebuild the line at 5 - 10 ties per day.

Also the existing rail is going to be replaced. Its too light, too old, and too brittle.

Chris

Where did track removal begin?

Slate Hill or south of Middletown?

One mile south of Slate Hill to the southern end of the line in Unionville.

The rails on the northern 6-7 miles are being retained. South of that point the local zoning no longer supported future growth possibilities.

I just went to their THS website and read that the owners are now set on having a garbage transload facility again. I thought this was a dead topic but if I remember correctly, the agreement did allow for trash to be hauled as long as it was in sealed containers. If they can get this done, I gotta give them credit for bringing a railroad on life support back to a respectable operation. Now all they have to do is rehab the track and fix the crossings.....

SJ,

I read the same text and did not come up with the same assumption.

The text in the article came from the City of Middletown Comprehensive Plan which is dated August 2007. The main focus on the document is to list the "existing" conditions of the Town of Middletown, nothing more, nothing less. It will be used as the basis for the City's Master Plan. At the time it was printed the M&NJ had already stated and I believe signed the contract that they would not be shipping waste over the line. I spoke with the GM in September of last year and hauling waste was a dead issue at that point in time. With the market having gotten much worse since then, I doubt it is a possibility.

Also of note, the RR is pulling an additional 1,500 ft of track north of Lime Kiln Road. Originally the VRA was given the opportunity to relocate our speeder storage container to that crossing, but for various reasons we didn't. Now it seems a good thing we didn't relocate to that point.

From the M&NJRHS Yahoo Group, bids for the rehab of the line in Middletown are being accepted soon. NS will be using DG yard to store track equipment and ties have been dropped along NS' branch.

The M&NJ has filed with the STB to lease the Campbell Hall Cluster from NS, effective 1 October.

http://www.stb.dot.gov/FILINGS/all.nsf/ ... enDocument

The 'Campbell Hall Cluster' is everything covered by NS HO-8 and H0-9 out of Campbell Hall; Maybrook Runner, Walden Industrial, Hudson Secondary (former L&HR), and the connection to the M&NJ from Four Story Junction.

There has been rumors for the last year that NS wanted to get out of the local business in Campbell Hall.

spflanger wrote:The M&NJ has filed with the STB to lease the Campbell Hall Cluster from NS, effective 1 October.

http://www.stb.dot.gov/FILINGS/all.nsf/ ... enDocument

The 'Campbell Hall Cluster' is everything covered by NS HO-8 and H0-9 out of Campbell Hall; Maybrook Runner, Walden Industrial, Hudson Secondary (former L&HR), and the connection to the M&NJ from Four Story Junction.

There has been rumors for the last year that NS wanted to get out of the local business in Campbell Hall.

The westernmost limit referenced in this filing is MP JS 67.50, which is no where near Four Story Jct. (67.5 is about one mile west of O&W bridge - seems like it's basically headroom to make a move at the west end of the Campbell Hall yard). This suggests to me that NS will still have a presence in Campbell Hall and will handle local business at Middletown and on the former Crawford Branch down into town...at least for now.

I'm amazed that Delaware Otsego (NYS&W) backed out of this last year. But, they did just want the Hudson Secondary Track.

nysw3636 wrote:I'm amazed that Delaware Otsego (NYS&W) backed out of this last year. But, they did just want the Hudson Secondary Track.

From what I was told, the main money maker is a chemical company up there, which I assume is the place in Warwick. Supposedly the EPA over the next year or 2 will be banning two of the chemicals they currently make, which will theoretically cut down there car delivery or ultimately put them out of business, and once the NYSW caught wind of that they lost interest in Campbell Hall. This may also be a factor to why NS is looking to give this work away.

Yes, it's really cool the M&NJ could expand with this, but it also looks like they have quite a bit of work ahead of them in order to capitalize. However considering how much traffic the new owners brought back to the M&NJ, they just might make this work. Fingers are crossed...

What traffic is currently on the M&NJ?

Jim Rowland

From the time Regional Rail LLC bought the MNJ, they only had one customer on the line. Now, if I remember what the board in our office said, there is 4 or 5 on the line.

Do they run every week day, or just certain days? I'm off on Fridays and wanna try to go up there at some point to catch them working. Thanks in advance...

Any news as to how the M&NJ will operate CH and the hudson secondary come fri? Will they send up any new power from the other operation(east penn?)
Interesting to see if they will dispatch the line and how things will come about

Looks like the UTU is trying to stop this from happening. I doubt they will, but it could delay the start of the lease. The M&NJ also claims they could, in the future, interchange cars with the NYSW.

3 positions are being eliminated in CH, but those people are still going to work for NS in positions near Campbell Hall. I guess, take that for what it's worth...