Avon, IN: CSX/NYC/Big Four Avon Yard

Satellite

Greg Bunce posted
Here's ad from the November 1960 Trains magazine concerning the opening of Avon Yard.
Bill Edrington Cool ad -- thanks for sharing it -- but the NYC took a little bit of both historical and artistic license with it. The statement that the Big Four was "now" part of the Central system is a little misleading. The CCC&StL was under Vanderbilt control from the time it was formed by the consolidation of several predecessors in 1889, and was leased and operated directly by the NYC starting in 1930 (as was the Michigan Central). My favorite thing about this ad, though, is the mountain range in the distance. I guess those must be the Indiana Rockies, whose foothills begin around Danville and whose summit is near Greencastle.

INtransportHistory (please click the link for a good history)
[Around 1960 the ICC shot down NYC+C&O and Pennsy+N&W mergers.]
Richard McClelland Simpson III posted

In the last decade of the existence of the New York Central, the railroad did their best to modernize, trying to make the company profitable again. They built four of the most advanced railyards at the time: Buffalo, Elkhart, Youngstown and Avon.

It helped for a while...but not enough. And now, the Avon yard belongs to the railroad that the NYC wanted to merge with to survive, instead of the merger they ended up doing which led to disaster.

Richard Koenig posted

Avon Yard

Here we see a string of cars headed up over the hump at Avon, west of Indianapolis. This is along the former New York Central line between Indianapolis and Terre Haute.

The string of road power seen is making its way from the engine facility to waiting outbound trains. Again, we’re just a week into the Conrail era with most things around here looking like the Penn Central.

One image by Richard Koenig; taken April 9th 1976.

Doug Meyer Is that "Tower 2" on the left side?
Robert L. Burns Doug Meyer That's the retarder tower.

A Flickr Album of scans of literature about the yard.

A tour.

Harrison's slash and burn continues to, in his mind, earn his $300,000,000: Avon Yard to shutdown Aug 1. Supposedly three other yards in the Indianapolis area that aren't as big and that are not on the main east/west route are supposed to be able to handle the traffic. (source (I learned from the comments that CN's decision to move operations from the Joliet EJ&E Yard and the IC Homewood Yard to Kirk Yard was considered a bad idea by the employees. Was this decision made by Harrison when he worked for the CN?))

Aug 3, 2017: "Rapier says many of them are stunned that CSX, which made $1.7 billion last year, would even need to eliminate their positions. They point the fingers at the new CEO, who Rapier believes is motivated by greed." "Rapier says the union contract states CSX must give workers at least five days' notice before cutting their jobs. But he claims that wasn’t done earlier this summer when CSX let go nearly 50 workers from the Avon railyard maintenance facility, so they’re bracing themselves for the same thing to happen again." [fox59, source] Harrison not only lays off workers, he does it is the cruelest way imaginable by leaking that they are going to be axed and then let them agonize about where and when the axe is going to fall.