Cleveland railroad history

Cleveland railroad has long been a major part of railroad, from the late 19th century to present day.

History

Early rail history

Cleveland railroading began in the 19th century when the New York Central and Nickel Plate Road (New York, Chicago, & St. Louis) built two major lines along Lake Erie that handled major traffic per day, and had major yards on them at this point.

NKP's line bridged over the NYC's line in the western part of Cleveland, and the NYC line wyed in the mid-Cleveland area. One leg of the wye was an entity of NYC, the Cleveland, Cincinnati, Chicago and St. Louis (named Big Four).

CCC&StL and the NYC came close to one another and paralleled each other for one mile (1.6 km) in west of Cleveland in Berea. After this point, the CCC&StL continued southwest to Cincinnati and the NYC continued west to Toledo.

The NKP line continued west to Bellevue where they had two major hump classification yards. Then it wyed. One branch headed south to Columbus and Kentucky, one continued west through Fostoria to Fort Wayne, IN.

After these three divisions built through Cleveland, a commuter line (somewhat like a trolley/street car) called the "Cleveland Union Terminal Railroad" (CUT) built around the downtown area of Cleveland. NYC had joint ownership of this railroad three years after its formation.

Another short line conglomerate system built around in a loop shape near downtown called the Newburgh & South Shore Railroad (N&SS). Back in the those times, what is now "Harvard" was called "Newburgh."

With now nearly 190 miles (310 km) of track in and around the downtown Cleveland area, the Erie Railroad thought they ought to step in, which they did, purchasing 300 miles (480 km) of property, and built a 300-mile (480 km) line from Cleveland to Connellsville, PA (just south of Pittsburgh).

Wheeling & Lake Erie came into town about a year later with their line that ran south to Canton. At this time, Cleveland's industrial environment had seen a good upgrade with a lot of railroads serving the area.

Railroads built branch lines and industrial lines off of the main lines, and soon Cleveland had 960 miles (1,540 km) of track.

By this time, Pennsylvania had built their line from Pittsburgh into town, and Baltimore and Ohio built a line north from central Akron into town. A shortline switching company, the "River Terminal" railroad, was formed.

1950 to 1990

In the early 1950s, NKP started to fail at business, and in 1964, N&W bought the NKP. Now the NKP Lake line was in N&W's name, and N&W cancelled many of their stops in Cleveland, which forced other railroads to have to make runs instead of N&W.

W&LE acquired one of the runs, and B&O acquired the other five. B&O had nearly 120 miles (190 km) of track in the Cleveland corporation limits at this time.

In 1967, NYC became PC, and then thought-to-be successful Penn Central canceled all of their stops in Cleveland, which put two factories in the hole. And one shut down completely.

One industry refused an offer from River Terminal and Newburgh & South Shore. They offered immediate business. The factory still turned them down, and eventually, the lights faded in that industry.

By this time, there were only a handful of industries left, when suddenly, a factory from "Whiskey Island" called B&O up (which at the time was filing for bankruptcy to Chessie system) to make the runs.

In 1971, B&O made their first run to Whiskey Island, and the Island seemed really successful, until Chessie took charge in 1972. Chessie cancelled their stop there in 1975 after acquiring Western Maryland and obtaining more 'important' runs.

PC went bankrupt to Conrail a year later in 1976, and Conrail was a bright future for Cleveland. They re-opened many of the runs in Cleveland, and acquired the train to Whiskey Island.

Pretty soon, all you could find in Cleveland was Conrail. Conrail bought the CCC&StL, the NYC, the Pennsylvania, and the Erie.

Chessie was soon in competition with this and contacted many factories in Cleveland in search for trains to run, but it had seemed Conrail acquired all of them, the only Chessie run left, was the run to the dock facility near downtown, which was failing.

An unmentioned N&W line serving the dock was also in use, but failing severely. It wasn't long until the dock facilities went out, and N&W and Chessie had no runs left in Cleveland.

The Big Blue obtained N&SS and RT in 1979, then re-opened all the shortline companies as one single entity known as "Cleveland Works Railway Organization" (CWRO). The CWRO consisted of the "Cuyahoga Valley Industrial Railroad, the Newburgh & South Shore, the River Terminal and the Cleveland Union Terminal.

In 1980, Chessie was absorbed by CSX, and CSX opened one single line back to two tiny companies near the Cuyahoga River in Cleveland. CSX started making some money here, so they continued those runs.

In 1982, the old N&W line was acquired in the merger by NS. NS also had some success at finding a couple needy businesses near downtown Cleveland. This run stayed open.

NS had spun off 16 miles (26 km) of track at this time, and a Class III bought it right up, without any engines or rolling stock, known as the "Flats Industrial" railroad corporation.

FI arrived at an agreement and signed a contract with Conrail that they be under joint ownership with Conrail and the CWRO. FI was given one single SW1001 at the time, which is what they still have.

In late 1982, CWRO and Conrail got a call from local Cleveland welding and iron ore companies and one dock facility. They asked if they could have the CWRO companies serve their industry, which ran for 8 miles (13 km) along the Cuyahoga River.

They paid the CWRO $1.5 million up front. Of course, Conrail got a percentage of this money. The CWRO at this time was very successful, and bought 19 switcher locomotives which they keep based at the south end of the welding company.

Conrail soon paid the welding company for an outdoor barn-sized storage building. After the arrangements were made, Conrail gave this building to CWRO for a fee of course, and made it CWRO's own, personal repair shops.

In 1984, the Cleveland Union Terminal tracks were sold to the Regional Transit Authority (RTA) as a commuter business. The RTA still makes big bucks today in 2006.

1990 to present

In 1999, Conrail was split up on June 1 between NS and CSX. CSX got the former CCC&StL trackage, and the former B&O trackage. NS got the former NYC trackage and PRR trackage. the former N&W trackage and the N&SS trackage which it bought from the CWRO in 2000 for $2.2 million.

Conrail

The Conrail system in Cleveland featured a number of routes and secondary lines. The former New York Central Chicago Line was the primary east-west route through Cleveland, with the addition of the former Pennsylvania Railroad's Cleveland line allowing traffic to and from the Pittsburgh region to pass through to points near Buffalo or Chicago and Detroit. The Conrail system also included the former Big Four mainline, as well as New York Central Cleveland Short Line, which was a bypass around the congested downtown trackage. The Conrail system also included the Randall Secondary, which was the former Erie mainline into Cleveland. The Randall Secondary was in a steady decline under Conrail due to the lack of online business. The last train to the end of the line in Mantua was in the early 1990s. Until the Conrail split, the Randall Secondary saw occasional service to a frozen food plant in Solon, Ohio.

In the late 1990s, Conrail began several large projects along their system in anticipation of the NS/CSX split. These projects included adding a second track to the 100+ year old Marcy Trestle over the Cuyahoga River, the restructuring of the interchange and diamond between the Big Four and Cleveland Short Line, and the addition of a second mainline track on the Big Four mainline from Berea south to the connection with the CSX (former B&O) Chicago Line at Greenwich, Ohio.

Cleveland Works Railway

The ISG Cleveland Works Railway (CWRO) was created in 2002 as a terminal and switching railroad for International Steel Group's Cleveland Works steel mills. This railroad was created when ISG purchased and combined the assets from the River Terminal(RT)and Cuyahoga Valley (CUVA) Railways (not to be confused with the Cuyahoga Valley Scenic Railway). Both of these rail lines handled switching in and around the Cleveland steel mills and Sun Oil distribution center. Although the RT and CUVA Railways were out of the railroad business they continued to distribute benefits to former railway employees for years afterward.

Norfolk Southern

The Norfolk Southern system through Cleveland was fairly lean, consisting only of the former Nickel Plate mainline with some industry along the route. NS did not run any trains on the former Wheeling line, and sold the line to the new Wheeling and Lake Erie in 1990. The NS mainline through Lakewood, Ohio was the site of a heated battle between the railroad and the city over noise complaints. Lakewood features a large number of level grade crossings in very close proximity, each requiring a horn sounding. Through the 1990s, traffic levels dropped off, and then rebounded. The rebound in traffic caused alarm from citizens living near the tracks. Congressional representatives stepped in, and numerous ideas were floated to alleviate the complaints of the community. Ideas included increasing crossing safety to allow for horn-exempt crossings, and even fleet scheduling of trains to avoid excessive nighttime trains. The discussions continued well into the late 1990s, when the discussion about the Conrail breakup began. As a condition of the breakup, Norfolk Southern received the former New York Central Chicago Line from the downtown Cleveland drawbridge to points west. Using an upgraded interchange track between the Nickel Plate main and the former Big Four at a location known as Cloggsville, NS was able to route a majority of their trains off of the Nickel Plate and therefore avoiding the city of Lakewood, much to the relief of local citizens.

During the Conrail breakup, Norfolk Southern received the former Pennsylvania Railroad mainline from Cleveland to Pittsburgh, the former New York Central mainline from the Cuyahoga River drawbridge west to Chicago, the Big Four mainline from DK Tower on the south side of downtown Cleveland to the connection with the Cleveland Short Line just east of Rockport Yard, which was also given to NS, and the former Erie mainline known to Conrail as the Randall Secondary. NS also received trackage rights over the Cleveland Short Line from the Harvard Connection west to Rockport Yard.

In 2009, the Randall Secondary was leased to the Cleveland Commercial Railroad. Loads for customers are interchanged via the NS at the crossing and interchange track with the NS Cleveland Line. The Cleveland Commercial crews are based out of Falls Junction on the Wheeling and Lake Erie, but use a connection through a scrap dealer to transfer to the former Erie side of their operation.

Newburgh & South Shore

The Newburgh & South Shore has been owned by OmniTrax since the 1990s. The majority of the N&SS operation revolves around their Marcelline Yard in Newburgh Heights, with switching duties at American Steel and Wire.

Wheeling & Lake Erie Railway

On May 17, 1990, the Wheeling and Lake Erie Railway (1990) began operations over several hundred miles of secondary routes across Ohio previously owned by Norfolk Southern. This included the original Wheeling and Lake Erie Cleveland Line to Canton. Primary commodities shipped included coke and scrap metal. The Wheeling typically ran two turns into Cleveland each weekday. In 2001, citing economic downturn, LTV Steel decided to idle their Cleveland steel mills, which hurt business for the Wheeling, whose primary customer in Cleveland proper was the steel industry. In early 2002, the Wheeling embargoed the Cleveland Line from CP Harvard to the terminus at Campbell Yard. This line was shut down due to a combination of little traffic, increased wait times at the CP Harvard crossing with the NS (former Conrail) Cleveland Line, and subsequent vandalization of stopped trains at the Harvard crossing. The remaining Wheeling line was truncated into an interchange track with the NS Randall Secondary.

In early 2002, the Independent Steel Group reopened the mills in Cleveland and once again requested coke trains from the Wheeling. The Wheeling decided to use trackage rights which were grandfathered to them from the original Wheeling and Lake Erie over the former Big Four line from Wellington to Cleveland. Wheeling continues to operate coke trains into Cleveland via Big Four trackage rights.

W&LE Cleveland Line lease

In late 2002, the Wheeling began leasing the remainder of the Cleveland line from Falls Junction to the interchange track near CP Harvard to the Connotton Valley Railway. This line mostly hauled scrap metal and steel coils. The Connotton Valley ran for a few years, also running a weekend excursion train from the historic Bedford depot to Falls Junction depot and back.

In 2004, the Connotton Valley Railway ceased operations, and the Wheeling leased the line to another new operator, the Cleveland Commercial Railroad. The Cleveland Commercial Railroad has had much more success than previous operator Connotton Valley, including the successful lease and operation of the Norfolk Southern Randall Secondary in 2009.

See also

References

    General references