Delaware and Raritan River Railroad-General Discussion

OK...Hopefully this wont get out of hand.

As someone who does not work for the C&D, but has spent some time in RR engines, and also on occasion takes pix of trains...

1. For railfans....Please know that from the cab on an engine, you look a lot closer to a train than it looks when standing on the ground. Fact is..if you are standing about 6' out from the cab, on the ground, you can disappear from view from the cab, which can be concerning for the crew. Different crew members have different levels of concern , depending on past experiences. No crew member EVER wants to have someone get injured where they are working, regardless of whos :"fault" it is.
Also...FWIW...not everyone likes ppl taking pictures of them doing their job, and then talking about what they did on the web. If i were the boss, Id never pay any attention to what someone says on the web.,,but Im not the boss.

2, As for the gentleman who obviously works for the C&D...Please lighten up a little. Concern can be warranted, and asking ppl to please stay a safe distance from tracks and equipment is fine....But i dont think its a good idea to come on like a ton of bricks with the "Stand Back, I'm a professional Railroader" attitude either.
I realize that some ppl who railfan do things that they shouldnt, but there are others whove been taking pix for longer than you've been alive, so being respectful in your remarks is not a bad idea.....IMHO. Also other ppl will respect u more, if u speak with respect.

Now...let get back to just some train movement reports.

There is nothing wrong with fans out there enjoying the hobby. Too many times do we see some of these fans out there standing on or too close to the tracks. In conversations that we had with some of the fans in the past, they mention that they get their information from or post to railroad.net, which is fine. My comments of being safe are not geared towards everyone here, just those few that are putting themselves in harms way. You say that you are not children but some of those adults are the ones putting themselves into a bad position that can get very bad, very fast. My comments are not to deter you all from enjoying the hobby. Too many times I have seen things go wrong in this industry and when they do go wrong it goes wrong very fast and sometimes without warning. With the crowds gathering at crossings, you do not want to be the one who gets hit by a car because the driver was not paying attention or if that driver was paying attention to the people taking pictures and get hit by us, then their car get impacted into the fans standing too close. It is ok to enjoy the hobby just please do so at a safe distance.

NJTMonmouthCoastline wrote: ↑Fri Jul 22, 2022 10:38 pm

AceMacSD wrote: ↑Fri Jul 22, 2022 10:08 pm I hope that you all had fun out there today. To those who think its ok to sit on signal boxes or encroach on the crossings, that's not your property and being so close to the train is dangerous. Please stay clear of the tracks and let us work safely. You don't need to be up against the train to take a picture of it and you definitely do not need to be standing in the gauge to take your pictures. These trains are dangerous and don't care about your shots. Please stay clear of the tracks!

With all due respect. We are grown ups not kids.

We know better on where to stand & how far away we should be away from the train.

Btw my fellow rail friends & colleagues aren’t happy with how the crews are behaving towards the rail fans & the locals in Lakewood.

It’s not good if y’all have a bad attitude towards others that have a hobby of seeing trains. And if WoodHaven & other customers see how “toxic” things are, they will leave!

I’d suggest that the train crews get their act together and start to be more respectful to rail fans & the locals because if not, you will lose the Southern.

Let’s just get along please & if you don’t like it down here either just deal with it or leave

You may be older, but you certainly are not acting like an adult with an attitude and comment like that.

Seriously, that is one of the most entitled, arrogant, wrongheaded comments I have ever read on this forum, and that is certainly saying a lot. Comments and attitudes like this are 90% of why you don't see me on here much anymore.

Lets make one thing clear. You are buffs, railfans, foamers, enthusiasts, ferroequinologists, whatever you want to call yourself, it doesn't matter. We are railroaders. Yes, there is some crossover here, and some of us can be both, to varying degrees. See the key difference here though? We are railroaders. That means we work on the railroad.

To simply that for you, when you see us, we are at work. We are not entertainers, we are not performers, we do not show up for your enjoyment, we are doing what we do because someone is buying our skilled labor for less than they charge someone else for it.

Our jobs are stressful, tedious, dangerous, you name it. Our skills take years to acquire and master. You may enjoy watching us work, and we may, sometimes or most times, enjoy having you watch us. We may engage you in various ways, waving, blowing the horn, etc. Regardless of that, however, we are still at work. We are professionals doing a job. If you don't like that, or disagree with the idea that we are not performing for you, find another hobby.

As to this idea that a customer would care how the railroads employees treat buffs, instead of the service they provide, well, see Proven Theory #2 below...

The amount of entitlement is astounding with some here.

I've worked in Lakewood for 20 years delivering the mail and I'm not surprised at all if there's issues with misbehavior such as people standing or parking too close to the tracks. A perfect example I witnessed was on the C&D inaugural run back on July 8th. I caught the Woodhaven-bound train crossing route 9 and posted a video of it on YouTube. After the last car cleared the crossing, I stopped the video and then noticed two teenagers run from a group up to the last car, jump on, and ride for about 75 feet before jumping off. You can see the group of young adults at the very end of my video. THAT'S the kind of crap that shouldn't be tolerated by anyone.

Yep. That’s been going on for years. All fun and games until one falls off and cracks his skull on the rail. That’s happened in Lakewood before.

It should be noted that Chesapeake and Delaware has begun to heavily crack down on that sort of activity as well as the trespassing. The method they are using is the same one Conrail and Lakewood Police tried about a decade prior, where the police ride the train through town with cameras. Only issue is they are yelling everyone regardless of wether they are clear of the tracks or not, just like last time. Not long after this, Conrail ran an operation lifesaver style campaign for a few weeks when the “use the police to bother everyone” tactic didn’t go so well. The campaign was fairly successful but was only ever done once, so it’s effects didn’t last long. Hence the rise in dangerous activities trackside by the locals.

As much as I agree that it is an issue which needs to be dealt with, it’s one that should be handled carefully. We need to remember that the majority of people who ride the train through Lakewood and walk down the tracks live sheltered lives. Anything normal to us is a whole different universe to them. They’ve never been taught what to do and not do around trains. Therefore, I feel calmly warning them about the dangers in a respectful way on their level is paramount to avoiding further incidents in a way that they don’t interpret as hostile. I’ve heard many stories of what the Rabbis do when their people feel like they are being threatened, and I’m very concerned that C&D may come to blows with said people should this not be handled in a way the locals seem respectful.

I believe C&D and the locals can come to a mutually beneficial solution to any problems they are having. Both parties simply need to be willing to communicate with each other and work to find said solution.

If I may pose a suggestion, why not put in pedestrian crossings in the areas where fences have gone up to allow safe passage of pedestrians, or to have a rail trail parallel to the tracks in certain areas so the locals have their cut offs without having to walk down the tracks? Best solution I can think of. Locals are happy, and no trespassing. It won’t solve the problem of people riding the train, but it would be a good start.

Just my $0.02 cents.

P.S. In no way was this intended to be slanderous or to defame C&D. I’m just trying to raise my concerns.

"There is nothing wrong with fans out there enjoying the hobby. Too many times do we see some of these fans out there standing on or too close to the tracks. In conversations that we had with some of the fans in the past, they mention that they get their information from or post to railroad.net, which is fine. My comments of being safe are not geared towards everyone here, just those few that are putting themselves in harms way. You say that you are not children but some of those adults are the ones putting themselves into a bad position that can get very bad, very fast. My comments are not to deter you all from enjoying the hobby. Too many times I have seen things go wrong in this industry and when they do go wrong it goes wrong very fast and sometimes without warning. With the crowds gathering at crossings, you do not want to be the one who gets hit by a car because the driver was not paying attention or if that driver was paying attention to the people taking pictures and get hit by us, then their car get impacted into the fans standing too close. It is ok to enjoy the hobby just please do so at a safe distance."

Well said. Thank You.

Sirsonic.....Im not trying to stake sides here. but your tone and attitude IMHO, isnt helping. Kindly asking ppl to behave more responsibly, goes a lot farther than yelling at them,.

And for whoever mentioned it, I would not put railfans in the same category as kids jumping on the back of a train, which is obviously totally irresponsible and dangerous. The cops should be hauling those kids into the station, and calling their parents to come pick them up. Its only gotten worse with there being news articles about young guys riding on the outside on NYC subway cars. Testosterone run amuck.

Now, are we all going to calm down.

Going off of what someone else said - at the end of the day, companies using rail service tend to only really care about the bottom line, not if the train crew is allegedly being rude to people, like railfans. As long as using the train to receive lumber is considerably cheaper than delivering it by truck, and said company receives their deliveries in a timely fashion, said company will most likely continue using rail service.

So far, C&D/DRRR has been doing deliveries twice a week, around the same time, during the day. Compare that to CR, which did deliveries pretty late into the day/night, was often very inconsistent, and refused to do it more than once a week.

NJTMonmouthCoastline wrote: ↑Fri Jul 22, 2022 10:38 pm

With all due respect. We are grown ups not kids.

We know better on where to stand & how far away we should be away from the train.

Btw my fellow rail friends & colleagues aren’t happy with how the crews are behaving towards the rail fans & the locals in Lakewood.

It’s not good if y’all have a bad attitude towards others that have a hobby of seeing trains. And if WoodHaven & other customers see how “toxic” things are, they will leave!

I’d suggest that the train crews get their act together and start to be more respectful to rail fans & the locals because if not, you will lose the Southern.

Let’s just get along please & if you don’t like it down here either just deal with it or leave

No you don't. You've trespassed numerous times and on camera and yet you constantly deny it and better yet you keep doing it. Which is why we lost one of the Lehigh Line spots as it is.

Don't try to put the blame on the crews. It's THEIR job they're doing while all we do is just watch the train. An attitude like that is how we lose more spots so drop the attitude.

NJTMonmouthCoastline wrote: ↑Fri Jul 22, 2022 10:38 pm With all due respect. We are grown ups not kids.

We know better on where to stand & how far away we should be away from the train.

Btw my fellow rail friends & colleagues aren’t happy with how the crews are behaving towards the rail fans & the locals in Lakewood.

It’s not good if y’all have a bad attitude towards others that have a hobby of seeing trains. And if WoodHaven & other customers see how “toxic” things are, they will leave!

I’d suggest that the train crews get their act together and start to be more respectful to rail fans & the locals because if not, you will lose the Southern.

Let’s just get along please & if you don’t like it down here either just deal with it or leave

This is hilarious.

I think this is getting out of hand.

I really don't have a dog in this fight, although I am supposedly a rail fan. I don't wait for them to take pictures, etc. I'm just interested in them expanding and prospering.

But this is past the "let's have a beer and hash it out" stage and is making this thread downright unpleasant. Which, to me is a shame. All of it, up to and including some of the wild-ass speculation was a source of enjoyment and knowledge for me. And I really, really want to see Freehold-Farmingdale done so the freight in this area is done on a more rational basis.

At least when my family members argue, there is an intensity in their differences, but not outright hostility.

Thanks to those of you who are effing up what I thought was a good thing.

OK, now have at me.

Sometimes it's best to just bury the hatchet and not make an argument last longer than it should. Even if something said is really pissing you off. Last time this happened in the CR thread, the moderators locked the thread for a few days so everyone could chill the hell out.

A "quarantine," if you will.

Locking this thread! No More Discussion! David!!!

Good morning friends of the Southern,

My name is Kean Burenga and I am President of the Chesapeake and Delaware and Black River Railroad Systems.

For nearly six decades my family has earned an honest living catering to train enthusiasts of all ages and backgrounds, first and foremost by protecting the schedules of Trains 102-109 between Flemington and Ringoes since Black River & Western Railroad Timetable No. 2.

Please know that we have no quarrel with anyone who shares our passion for steel wheels on steel rails.

As a matter of fact we appreciate your interest in our railroads, our equipment, and our business. From time to time we take a moment to enjoy the photos and the videos.

JohnFromJersey, your video of 752 at Squankum/Yellowbrook Road is a classic.
https://youtu.be/_06xuhqiza4I shared this with family at a reunion this weekend to everyone's great enjoyment.

She was the first locomotive I purchased and we know she is special. So it is fitting when she leads a plain Jane 38 of less glamorous lineage. Yes, we also know she needs a paint job and should be retired to passenger trains on the Black River, but duty calls. Maybe more on her some other time...

Bracdude181, your sentiments on the 2005 are spot on. POS. But locomotives are like girlfriends, "If you can't be with the one you love, love the one you're with." And check out her wheels! Maybe someday they will end up under the 752:)

It is true we have plenty of problems at Lakewood, but none of them involve the railfan community.

My crews are top notch and are dedicated to serving the customers in a safe and efficient manner. If you respect their vocation, they will respect your avocation.

As a note, any persons representing themselves as representatives of the CAD/BRS System in this discussion board or any other forum are frauds or imposters. Real railroad employees are prohibited by rule and policy from posting to any social media anything related to our business or operations. (Even I am stepping out here, in the interest of setting the record.) I assure you that they are not part of my management team and do not represent this Company's policy or views. They know nothing more than public information, and their statements are personal opinions and speculative at best.

Know that Chesapeake and Delaware is committed to investing heavily in the Southern & Freehold infrastructure, providing safe and dependable rail service to the customers, being a responsible member in the communities we serve, and growing the business.

You all do what you do. We will do what we do. We all have to be safe.

All the best,

KB