Detroit, MI: West Detroit Tower: MC vs (GTW+WAB and LSMS+MC)

(3D Satellite)

What the title should have been if I had the room: NS+Amtrak/MC vs (CN+Amtrak/GTW+WAB and CRSA/(NYC/LSMS+MC)) CRSA = Conrail Shared Assets

David Parker posted
Conrail West Detroit. June 1st 1981 (Photo by David Parker) Ray Peacock: Still labeled by NYC signage Tom Barnett: I once asked TC Robinson, the BRAC TC Division union vice general chairman out of Cleveland, which tower operator’s job, was the absolute busiest, all ex PC Conrail territory west of Buffalo/Pittsburgh, westward to Chicago/St Louis, included? His answer: “West Detroit.” Better know what you were doing, to sit down in the chair at West Detroit.

Charles Geletzke Jr. posted
Westbound on the GTW approaching the diamond at West Detroit, Michigan on January 6, 1991. On the left is the Conrail (former NYC-PC) West Detroit interlocking tower. Here I was running on Track #1 (the only yard on the entire GTW where the Main Track actually had a number and was not formally designated as a Main Track!). The five tracks that we were about to cross were the former MC Mainline from buffalo to Chicago. Beyond the diamond we would enter the N&W's (former Wabash) double-tracked Old Mainline to Delray, which had spring switches at each end requiring trains to keep to the right. The curving tracks to the right was the west end of the GTW's West Detroit Yard and connected to the C&O's (former PM) line to Oak Yard. The Wabash and GTW track was also used by the D&TSL. (C. H. Geletzke, Jr. photo)
T.J. Gaffney: She was already boarded up by then? I didn’t think she came down until ‘95 or so….
Peter Dudley: All of the Junction Avenue railroad overpasses at West Detroit were completed in 1907. The two GTW bridges (right) were replaced by a new single-track overpass (with abutments for a second track) in December 2015, as part of the ongoing effort to improve Amtrak's Pontiac / Chicago WOLVERINE route.

Charles Geletzke Jr. shared

Peter Dudley commented on Charles' post

The trees (center) and the highball signal mark the location of long-gone Grand Trunk Junction Passenger Station, erected by Chicago, Detroit & Canada Grand Trunk Junction Railroad (CD&CGTJ) in 1859.

Grand Trunk Junction (re-named West Detroit in 1887) defined the western terminus of Grand Trunk Railway of Canada (GTR), which stretched east to the Atlantic seaboard at Portland ME -- making it the world's longest railroad mainline operated by a single entity.

The station was demolished no later than 1907, when all of the tracks at West Detroit were elevated.

Until 1887, Junction Avenue was officially-known as Lovers' Lane (!)

The attached, slightly-shopped excerpt from an 1884 Sanborn fire insurance map shows Grand Trunk Junction, the 1859 GTR Passenger Depot and Freight House, a railroad YMCA Reading Room, Lovers' Lane, and a little hotel (the Amos House, NOT The Shady Rest) at the Junction.

Mike Delaney posted two photos with the comment:

West Detroit Tower in the old days. Illustrations by Jim Harlow, photos credit as marked. Jim Harlow is at the machine, former Conrail Tower operator in Detroit Area. Top photo by Gary Daniels and bottom photo by Dave Parker.

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[Per the comment below by westdetroit: "Where it's labeled Military x over is actually just a cross over between the #6 and #5 Freight mains (#4 and #5 were switching leads from Livernois and #6 was mainly used for light power). Military was further west and was a connection to Livernois Yard."]

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