Photo of the Month - February 2008

CA&C Crossing

200dpi jpg (178K) prr-7693

Pennsylvania Railroad compound Mallet #7693 pulling a string of cars across the CA&C crossing headed for the PRR's Pennor Yard.  #7693 is a class CC-2s, 0-8-8-0 used in hump and transfer service in Columbus.  The time is the 1940's, photo from the Jay Williams Collection*.

        The photographer has taken an interesting shot showing in detail the special work needed to construct a crossing diamond.  The two tracks in the foreground are for the Cleveland, Akron and Columbus line of the PRR.  The three tracks going away from the camera tie the PRR's Pennor Yard in the distance to the PRR's Grogan Yard behind the camera.  Mostly coal trains from the south were received by Pennor Yard, transferred by these slow, but powerful engines to Gorgan Yard and finally sent on their way to the Sandusky docks on Lake Erie. All this took place on the near north side of Columbus, Ohio

        The  engine in the distance is most likely an HH-1, 2-8-8-2 purchased from the N&W during World War II.  It was also used in transfer service.  The roundhouse belongs to the N&W and their Joyce Avenue Yard is beyond the roundhouse to the right of Pennor Yard.  Between the far engine and the roundhouse you can see the silhouette of the Joyce Avenue bridge.

        What you can't appreciate from this photo is the noise made by a CA&C freight train rattling through these three diamonds at speed.  Today all that is left from this scene are two through tracks of the Norfolk Southern Railroad carrying trains between Portsmouth on the Ohio River and Sandusky on Lake Erie.