Physical connections between different transit lines

Thesea...: Firstly, I was talking about a connection to the present day Blue Line, the Saugus Branch goes entirely in the other direction. You say the Grand Junction goes nowhere near Everett, but splits in Chelsea. Well how exactly do you think it gets to Chelsea?

Some simple research tells the story about how the Eastern Route and the Grand Junction came to be, in part, one in the same. Freight operations currently end in Everett on what is now considered the Eastern Route but is actually part of the Grand Junction which went to East Boston connecting with the Blue Line. That's exactly what I said.

Arborwayfan: No pictures of that, but I did once see a Type 5 towing a PCC under the el on Causeway Street by North Station. Think they were headed to the Everett shops. Unfortunately no picture of that either.

Type7trolley wrote:

Arborwayfan wrote:Does anyone have a picture of a trolley being towed by a C-D car, in the subway or elsewhere? I've just enjoyed an hour of looking for one online, with no luck (or at least no luck finding that particular picture; I saw a lot of other interesting ones.)

I forget where I found this, but anyway..

NICE FIND!
I believe that's the first photo I've seen of this operation.

Type7trolley wrote:

Arborwayfan wrote:Does anyone have a picture of a trolley being towed by a C-D car, in the subway or elsewhere? I've just enjoyed an hour of looking for one online, with no luck (or at least no luck finding that particular picture; I saw a lot of other interesting ones.)

I forget where I found this, but anyway..

Interesting photo, the same one appears in the BSRA Bulletin #9 titled Rapid Transit Boston pg. 33. Also credited to B.H. Clarke.

JoeD

Thanks, Type 7! Great picture!

A severed connection, this reminds me of what Arborway must look like , abandoned from everything :

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Nobody mentioned it, but there is a connection between the Orange Line and the Medford Branch, which connects to the Haverhill Line. So theoretically, the Orange Line has direct access to the national rail network. However, this hasn't been used in god-knows-how-long. It was cleared of all brush about 3 or 4 years ago, but it has since started to grow back in.

This is a bit of a stretch, but bear with me...

Before the narrow-gauge Boston, Revere Beach and Lynn Railroad was abandoned in 1940, there was a connection between the BRB&L and the Eastern Route in Revere. It went from just south of the current Wonderland station across the Rt. 1A rotary or maybe across the parking lot of the mall there. I'll try and dig up a map that shows the connection.

Although it wasn't the Blue Line at the time, you could say that the future Blue Line was connected to the B&M at that point in Revere.

I believe there was also a connection between the Eastern and the BRB&L in Lynn just north of GE, but I haven't been able to find a map that definitively shows it.

(Of course since the gauges were different there wouldn't have been any equipment that could actually operate on both. Like I said, it's a bit of a stretch.)

This is the "connection" at Lynn. The four rail track continued for a few rail lengths
and, that was it. No idea how or for what it was used.
LS

StefanW wrote:This is a bit of a stretch, but bear with me...

Before the narrow-gauge Boston, Revere Beach and Lynn Railroad was abandoned in 1940, there was a connection between the BRB&L and the Eastern Route in Revere. It went from just south of the current Wonderland station across the Rt. 1A rotary or maybe across the parking lot of the mall there. I'll try and dig up a map that shows the connection.

Although it wasn't the Blue Line at the time, you could say that the future Blue Line was connected to the B&M at that point in Revere.

I believe there was also a connection between the Eastern and the BRB&L in Lynn just north of GE, but I haven't been able to find a map that definitively shows it.

(Of course since the gauges were different there wouldn't have been any equipment that could actually operate on both. Like I said, it's a bit of a stretch.)

There actually was no connection between the tracks. The B&M was in a fierce competition with the BRB&L for beach ridership and laid tracks immediately adjacent to the BRB&L's. Keep in mind they were of different gauges, too, so it wouldn't really have been possible to run a train from the Eastern Route and onto BRB&L trackage.

Also, the northern connection you mention was after crossing the Saugus River. You can trace a curved embankment where there was then a bridge over the Pines River to Point of Pines. From there, the tracks paralleled the BRB&L.

EDIT: I should have read your full post before jumping in -- you did note the gauges. My mistake.

Leo Sullivan wrote:This is the "connection" at Lynn. The four rail track continued for a few rail lengths
and, that was it. No idea how or for what it was used.
LS

Huh, well look at that. I wonder what the gauntlet track would have been for. Where in Lynn was this, exactly?

I could see them interchanging cars on that track by jacking up the carbodies and swapping out the trucks. I've heard of that being done elsewhere.

That makes the most sense since the track doesn't go anywhere and there's no switch (just a frog). I've seen dual gauge (not gauntlet, there's a difference) track where a rail is shared, which seems to make more sense for loading and unloading either passengers or freight, but I've never seen the two tracks come together completely separate like that. Derek's suggestion makes perfect sense for that application because you'd want the cars to remain centered when swapping trucks, and you wouldn't need an incredibly lengthy stretch because you'd like only do one or so cars at a time.

BostonUrbEx wrote:Nobody mentioned it, but there is a connection between the Orange Line and the Medford Branch, which connects to the Haverhill Line. So theoretically, the Orange Line has direct access to the national rail network. However, this hasn't been used in god-knows-how-long. It was cleared of all brush about 3 or 4 years ago, but it has since started to grow back in.

Going to need a lot of agent orange (no pun) for it to run again. Were the 01200s delivered through there in 1980?

MBTA3247 wrote:I could see them interchanging cars on that track by jacking up the carbodies and swapping out the trucks. I've heard of that being done elsewhere.

BRB&L was strictly passenger (I have a book or two and have read a bit on the line, and nothing suggests even the slightest of freight operations), so what would the purpose be? To outsource repairs? To receive new coach orders?

R36 Combine Coach wrote:

BostonUrbEx wrote:Nobody mentioned it, but there is a connection between the Orange Line and the Medford Branch, which connects to the Haverhill Line. So theoretically, the Orange Line has direct access to the national rail network. However, this hasn't been used in god-knows-how-long. It was cleared of all brush about 3 or 4 years ago, but it has since started to grow back in.

Going to need a lot of agent orange (no pun) for it to run again. Were the 01200s delivered through there in 1980?

I remember someone on this forum said they were, but I'm not sure to what extent. I've previously tried to dig up the discussion and could not find it. But I believe they claimed they were trucked (as opposed to by rail on flatcar) to some point on the Medford Branch and then towed into the yard/shops.