Highland Valley in TRS2010 (Screenshot Thread II)

A Guest Passenger for a Conrail Coal Drag

Hey everyone,

I appologize for this thread being quiet for so long, but changing the era of a route is much harder than I expected, haha. I've managed to complete the Afton Branch and finished up Greenwood. This set of screens is going to feature a big portion of Jointed Rail's and Pweiser's rollingstock, so make sure you thank Paul for providing all the beautiful New Haven content that really gives my modifications beauty, and be sure to take advantage of Jointed Rail's sale this weekend! I for one plan on purchasing their B-Boats! Also a huge thanks to all of the other content creators in the community, I hope you're all pleased with my placing of your content in my mod of CeeBee's route! And Ed, your buildings and vans are awesome! I live in the next town over from Sapperstein's, so I was very pleased to see it on your page of the DLS!

So, enough mushy talk, haha, please enjoy!


The Highland Terminal Railroad has been making grounds in building a larger collection of motive power and rolling stock for it's operation and collection, trying to save what they can from scrap and build a larger fleet. The Afton Mining Company recently donated their ALCo RS11 on the terms that the HTRR collect the unit on their dime. The RS11, a former New Haven unit, was purchased by the mine shortly after PC took in the New Haven's assetts. The mining company wanted to have a switching unit all to themselves to avoid the costs of continuing to have another company switch the mine's property, reducing the proffit earned from the natural resources they produced. Since the aging ALCo had been serving the facility already, PC simply sold the unit and left the engine on the mine's property, where it was patched with the company's name shorthly thereafter. The unit served the mine for a few years, until shortly after the time Conrail came into existence. The unit suffered a mechanical failure, and without a suitable shop (or resources for that matter), the engine was laid to rest in the back of the mine, and Conrail began switching for the company. Wanting to clean up the property, the mine's owners decided that donating the unit would be a more kindhearted fate for the engine than letting it rot in the weeds.

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HTRR contracted Conrail to bring the ALCo to the Greenwood Shops on one of their various freights that travel the line. In Greenwood, the unit will be restored to good working mechanical order. HTRR will restore the unit cosmetically at some point in the future. Plans were made, and it was decided to drag the engine off the branch on a loaded coal drag. Here we see the ALCo on the wye after just being dropped off by the mine's new resident switcher.

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Back in Stormont, the crew of the coal drag gets permission to back to the mine and collect the dead locomotive and the loaded coal cars. The train features a caboose which will be used as a shoving platform.

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The pair of GE's gently groans past the gravel pit, and backs past the signal protecting the control point.

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The crew then collects both the ALCo and the cut of loaded coal hoppers.

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The engineer radios to the dispatcher in Greenwood, and after receiving the clear to highball the mine the train is soon underway.

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Continued...
 
A Guest Passenger for a Conrail Coal Drag (Ctd...)

The pair of heavy GE's tow their shoving platform, dead engine, and loaded coal cars past the Stormont Amtrak station, terminal for passenger service on the Afton Branch.

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The train picks up speed as it leaves both town and yard limits.

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Rounding the curve into the reservoir.

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The freight passes the abandoned reservoir flag stop, which was built by the Engineering Division of the US Army's division based in Greenwood during the years after the Second World War. The stop was abandoned during the Penn Central era and has since laid dormant.

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Rumbling over the falls.

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Soon the train arrives in Robbins, where much has changed since the New Haven operated the region.

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A gated crossing was installed late in the Penn Central years, during which time passenger service was discontinued due to most people in the town choosing to drive to Greenwood rather than take a train off the branch to connect with service in Greenwood and Lumby. The gas station was remodelled after the NH's bankruptcy, but is now in the process of being torn down. The general store that once stood in town is now completely gone, replaced by a new gas station and a hardware store.

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Continued...
 
A Guest Passenger for a Conrail Coal Drag (Ctd...)

On the way through town, the train passes a crew performing some minor track work on one of the sidings.

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Waiting for the Conrail freight to pass, an Amtrak service waits in the hole. The F7's and aging lightweight cars have been removed from the branch, and a new GE "Pepsi Can" has entered service along with sleek Amflleets and a Horizon food service car. Despite the new faces, the dance is relatively the same as it was during the New Haven years.

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While passenger service came to a halt in Robbins, it's freight service certainly did not. Two boxcars are left on the old engine shed lead for the hardware store, and a reefer is usually left for the farm co-op on the same siding it's been left on for decades.

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The freight leaves yet another town and proceeds on it's home stretch to Greenwood.

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Continued...
 
A Guest Passenger for a Conrail Coal Drag (Ctd...)

Flanges squeal as the train passes over, round, and under, past the empty Army base.

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Passing over the main.

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The train comes off of the branch and approaches the yard.

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The 6-axles sneak in the alley between the old church and the new shops.

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The train gets funneled into the yard.

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Continued...
 
A Guest Passenger for a Conrail Coal Drag (Ctd...)

Arriving on it's designated track, the GE's meet a pair of MLW VIA passenger units with the bi-daily cross border service from Toronto. The train is laying over after it's morning run with a set of former CP and CN passenger cars and a cabless F-Unit for HEP. Come evening, the engines will fuel up and take on passengers before returning north. VIA has titled the train "The Greenwood Fox".

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Here we see the trains meet from the fire department's yard.

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The train comes to a halt in it's siding and the crew prepares to drop the coal cars and bring the ALCo over to the shops.

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While the crew regroups, we have a moment to tour the yard. At the station, a Conrail Geep idles on one of the disused platform tracks. Greenwood Union closed it's two long distance tracks during PC years after a decline in passenger service. The two inner tracks are now sufficient for the amount of passengers using the depot, and the two outters are now used for equipment storage and crew changes.

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On Track 1, Amtrak's "Highlander" service pauses for boarding. The train typically runs from Greenwood and down into Connecticut and eventually NYC via Lumby and Wolf Gorge Tunnel, with a power change occuring either in Lumby or New Haven depending on the availability of electric power. The overhead catenary between Greenwood and Lumby has been de-energized for several years, no longer permitting electric motors to access Greenwood under their own power.

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Continued...
 
A Guest Passenger for a Conrail Coal Drag (Ctd...)

Greenwood Union Station is still very much the same despite some minor upgrades for passenger convenience.

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The same can be really said for Greenwood itself. The old gas station was torn down, along with one of the more decrepid buildings in the city, and a museum was made out of the Army's interurban depot, where an old New Haven EMU couple rests on display.

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A travel agency and post office were built next door on the property where the freight house once stood. A New Haven caboose sits on display in a small park for people to enjoy, and the track leading to the new facilities was largely torn up, leaving a small amount for a switch engine to move passenger equipment to rest between moves.

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The roundhouse was abandoned several years ago, and the leads were removed. The water tower was torn down, however the coaling tower still stands. The leads for the water and coal towers are now used for storage, as can be seen by the dormant Amtrak F's and the privately owned heavyweight and caboose,

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Next to the round house is the dispatch office for Conrail's Greenwood operations which covers between Fox Brook Jct. and Coyote Point Jct. (which is the access point for trains travelling to Upstate NY/Canada), as well as the Afton Branch. There is also a fuel pad here for trains passing through. Here we see a Guilford Geep on the pad. Guilford replaced the Boston and Maine for service in the region.

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Continued...
 
A Guest Passenger for a Conrail Coal Drag (Ctd...)

One of the major changes in Greenwood is the upgrade of the dock. The facility was completely rebuilt with better intermodal access for road, rail, and river. Shortly after Penn Central's black was blended into Conrail's blue, a private railroad, the Greenwood Dock Railroad, came into existence. The GDR operates a single restored New Haven "High Hood" ALCo and owns the former NH "Dock Spur". The company also owns the heavyweight coach and caboose stored under the disused coal tower, which the GDR hopes to operate short excursions with in the future.

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The GDR handles the dock's three major commodities... cement, intermodal freight, and fuel.

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While the military is largely gone from the region, the dock's security is still an issue, and is now protected by both the US Coast Guard and Army.

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From the water, we see the main docks...

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Back in the yard, the freight we followed is just untying from it's coal cars. It pulls forward with the ALCo, then performs a reversing move onto the yards back track, passing the dock's intermodal facility.

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Continued...
 
A Guest Passenger for a Conrail Coal Drag (Ctd...)

The crew drops the ALCo off on the shop lead and then moves onto the yard's bypass track where it will wait new orders from dispatch.

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Inside the shop, one of the facility's switcher moves from it's storage track to bring the ALCo in.

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During it's move, it passes a pair of Superliners as well as a pair of ex-PRR lightweights. The Superliners are going on loan to VIA in Canada for testing on it's trains, while the Pennsy lightweights make up the region's Conrail business train.

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Outside, an Amtrak work train rests between assignments.

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The EMD sneaks between the inspaction and main shop buildings passing it's co-worker along the way. The GE was brought down from the Afton Branch and restored by Conrail to aid in shop switching.

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The EMD approaches the new customer outside on the shop lead. The shop was built by Conrail to replace the aging NH facility, however the reputation remains, and roads from all over bring their equipment to be worked on, as is evidenced by the CP Geep and MTA FL9.

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The switcher collects the elderly diesel and brings it inside for much needed work.

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That's all for now folks!
 
Thanks guys! I really appreciate the feedback!

Oh, and I don't what I was thinking when I mentioned JR's B-Boat's, haha. I meant C40-8's, although I was pretty tired when I posted all that, so cut me some slack, haha.
 
She's still alive guys, I've just been pretty busy with some other things, work in particular, haha. I work for a New Holland dealership full time and with the weather in the Northeast being great for people who make hay, I've been seeing an influx of hay equipment along with the tractors running them on top of my already hefty pile of tractors, skidsteers, backhoes, mowers, etc. And on top of that I've been working on my Jeep ZJ with buddy of mine... and on top of both of those, haha, I've been in the process of starting a metal recycling business with another friend... so I've been comming home lately and just meeting my bed face first, haha. I'll try to get some screenshots this weekend for everyone, it'll be one of the few where I'm out of parts for my Cherokee and won't have to practice my business skills, haha.

Everyone have a Happy 4th! Sorry my friends across the pond for throwing your tea in the ocean (I joke, I joke)!

Jesse
 
Okay, I'm a man of my word, so as promised, here's a teaser of things to come. I'm rebuilding the Lumby station to accomodate high-level Metro-North trains, and it's a process, haha. I also went and reskinned the TC Shoreliners into their period MTA schemes, and went through the list on the CT DoT red-stripes including their old and new schemes on both the Shoreliner I's and III's, as well as the Shoreline East scheme on the I's. Now that the skinning's done, I'm back to work on the route...

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