St. Paul, MN: BNSF/CB&Q and CP/Milwaukee Joint Mainline (Four Towers)

Division Street: (Satellite, the Bruce Vento Nature Sanctuary used to be full of tracks and the tower was a little east of the east point of the Division Wye.)

Hoffman: (Satellite, it was at the west end of the Milw Pigs Eye and CB&Q Dayton Bluff Yards}

Oakland: (Satellite, it was at the east end of the Milw Pigs Eye and CB&Q Dayton Bluff Yards)

Newport (KT): (Satellite, it controlled the connection to the former Rock Island Bridge and some crossovers. Crossovers between the CP/Milw and BNSF/CB&Q tracks still exist)

St. Croix: (Satellite)

Milwaukee and CB&Q each had a single track along the east side of the Mississippi River in St. Paul. They dispatched it as a shared double-track mainline.

The mechanical towers along this line were:

     Division Street.- CBQ tower.  Protected joint lines entrances to St. Paul Union Depot and connections to Mile Post 0 of GN and Mile Post 0 of NP., and to Q's North Yard.

     Hoffman Ave - Milw tower.  Protected west entrances to Q's Daytons Bluff Yard, Milwaukees St. Paul Yard (aka Pig's Eye), CGW's Belt Yard, and Barge Terminal.

     Oakland - CBQ tower. Protected east entrances to Daytons Bluff and Pig's Eye.

     Newport - MIlw tower.  Theoretically protected the crossing of the Q and Milwaukee.  Actually, though the lines crossed, there was no diamond, and it was handled with crossovers between the two lines.  Also, protected the Rock Island's connection to its' line over to South St. Paul.  From here, the Q followed a water level single track line along the Mississippi to St. Croix used primarily by westbounds.  The Milwaukee took an overland route to St, Croix via "Langdon Hill" used primarily for eastbounds  Grades were more favorable for eastbound trains, which is the reason for left hand running on the entire "joint line".

     St. Croix - CBQ tower,  This was a diamond crossing with cutoff tracks offering routing trains in either direction to/from the joint line to either the Q's double track river level line on the Wisconsin side, or the Milwaukees double track water level line on the Minnesota side.  Both lines crossed again (using bridges) at LaCrosse. Wi.

[LarryDoyle comment in TrainOrders]

I don't document the towers in order because I wanted to put the post and photo that motivated this research on top.

CB&Q Oakland Tower

Marty Bernard posted three photos with the comment:

The Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Paul and Pacific and the Chicago Burlington and Quincy each had a single track between Division Street Tower and St. Croix Tower in St. Paul, MN. The railroads are now the Canadian Pacific and the Burlington Northern Santa Fe. The tracks were/are along the east side of the Mississippi River. Division Street Tower was at the east end of St. Paul Union Station and St. Croix tower was where the railroads diverged for the CB&Q to remain on the east side of the River and the Milwaukee Road crossing over to the west side. Both lines then followed the River south (railroad east) for many miles. They met again in La Crosse, WI.

Between Division Street Tower and Oakland Tower were two yards. The CB&Q's was called Dayton Bluff after the adjacent bluff and was east of the joint double track mainline. The Milwaukee's was Pigs Eye after the adjacent lake. It was on the west (River) side of the main line. The south exit of Pigs Eye Yard was at Oakland Tower.

Oakland Tower could crossover trains between either track in either direction and let trains in and out of Pigs Eye. The tower is long gone but the interlocking plant is still there (remotely controlled) last time I went by.

The CB&Q employees at Oakland Tower were Operator/Levermen meaning they could write Train Orders and Clearances and pull levers. I substituted there in June 1964 for vacationing Operator/Levermen. 

The story continues with the captions to the photos.

Marty Bernard shared

Marty Bernard shared

Marty Bernard shared

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3. Oakland Tower was an armstrong interlocking plant. That meant you had to have strong arms (and back) to pull or push the levers that moved the points of the turnouts.

THE LEVERS: The green ones are for the turnouts and the red ones are for the signals. Those to the right are "pulled" and those to the left are not. 'Pulled" for the green levers mean the turnout is reversed. "Pulled" for the signals means they are green or yellow depending on the route through the interlocking plant.

Oakland Tower had three order boards (semaphore signals) to indicate the train should pickup orders. The red order board signals are labeled. The one that is not pulled, labeled MILWE, is for a Milwaukee Road train coming out of Pigs Eye Yard. The two that are pulled are labeled EAST and WEST for Eastbound and Westbound trains.
Kurt Einar Armbruster: I've always wondered: what did tower ops do when it got really SLOWWWW?
Marty Bernard: I don't remember this tower being really slow ever.
Steven Ford: The B&O had a couple of towers here in Baltimore like this . Female operators were not allowed to work them due to the strength it took to move them . ........I was told that the HOT freight out of Seattle set off his Kansas City cars at Pigs eye . I always wondered why they were not set off at Aberdeen ,South Dakota ?

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1. CB&Q Oakland Tower and Train 21, the Morning Zephyr at about 2:20 pm on June 10, 1964.
[More lanes of US-61 have been added across the foreground.]

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2. This is the westbound CB&Q Morning Zephyr crossing over at Oakland Tower on June 17, 1964. The rods from the levers in the tower are running from the middle of the picture to the lower left corner. The Order Board is down (no orders) for this train but up for a train coming the other way. There is no train coming the other way. To clear a train coming the other way I would realign the switches, clear the Home Signal, and drop the Order Board (unless I had orders dictated to me via the dispatcher's phone line by the dispatcher).
[A nice view of some of the signaling pipelines.]

CB&Q Division Street Tower

I included SPUD (St. Paul Union Depot) in the excerpt to make it easier to correlate this map with a contemporary map.

I added a yellow dot at the location of the tower. I based that location on these two photos by Andrew Koetz's Dad: 1 and 2. Andrew commented on the second photo that this was "End Of Track" for the Q (as far as mainlines are concerned) into St. Paul. (The 1955 flood of these yards is also of interest. And a 1965 flood.)

1952 St Paul East Quad @ 1:24,000

Marty Bernard posted
A CB&Q Zephyr in St. Paul
A CB&Q E7A leads what looks like the Chicago-bound Afternoon Zephyr on June 9, 1964. I'm standing near Division Street Tower in St. Paul. The first car must be Silver Dome, a flat top the Q made into the first dome car (note the straight line of windows the length of the car and the boxy instead of sleek dome). The state capitol dome is above the last dome car. To the right is the Great Northern engine terminal and to the left is the downtown.
Marty Bernard shared

Milwaukee Hoffman Avenue Tower and Milwaukee Dunn (Pigs Eye) and CB&Q Dayton Bluff Yards

Hoffman would be near the upper-left corner while Oakland was near the lower-right corner. The Dayton Yard was on the north side and the Dunn (Pigs Eye) Yard was on the south side.

1951 St Paul East @ 1:24,000

Marty Bernard posted two photos with the comment:

Here Is a Unique Interlocking Tower

The Milwaukee Road's Hoffman Avenue Tower was built literally against Dayton's Bluff in St. Paul. MN. And not to lose a track along the Bluff the tower was built on stilts. The tower faces west toward the river and the rods run vertically between the front stilts.

The railroad there was a Joint Line of combined CB&Q and Milwaukee Road trackage. It is still a Joint Line but the railroad names have changed to BNSF and CP. The Joint Line interlocking towers south (railroad east) from St. Paul Union Station (SPUD) were Division Street, Hoffman Avenue, Oakland, Newport, and St. Croix. The Joint Line Dispatchers were at Newport. The Rock Island used the Joint Line south to Newport then split off and crossed the River to Inver Grove and south.

I worked part of the Summer of 1964 substituting for the vacationing operator/leverman at the CB&Q's Oakland Tower. I still kick myself for never going up in Hoffman Avenue Tower.

Kick. OUCH!  I understand the tower has been dismantled.  Kick.  Kick!

Edward Miller: Why was the C&NW Disc Semaphores there did they interchange there as well?

Pete Kranz: CGW Hoffman Yard

Frank Campbell: We (CNW/CMO) Crews would get delayed quite a bit at Hoffman Interlocking back in the day. I'd walk up into Hoffman Tower to visit with Operator John Kennedy. Also true at Division Street Tower (CB&Q) with Day trick Operator Bob Szeremeta. Bob went on to Ft Worth to operate West Hump Operations from Texas.

Marty Bernard shared

George Lavallee: Q-1 went in front of the tower and there was a derailment that tipped towards the tower bending all of the rods. It was changed to switch tender until they put a new control board in the tower and electric switch machines. I do not remember when it was closed but my guess was about the time the BN dispatched and ran all towers from Mississippi/Westminster to St. Croix.

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Milwaukee Newport Tower

The information for this tower has been moved to its own notes.

CB&Q St. Croix

I put a purple circle around the CB&Q vs Milwaukee junction that St. Croix controlled. Milwaukee is the route that crosses the river here. Note also that the Mississippi Lock & Dam #2 is nearby.

1953 Stain Paul Quad @ 1:250,000

Marty Bernard posted two photos with the comment:

Milwaukee Road GP9 267 brings a freight northbound past St. Croix Tower, MN on June 24, 1964.  She has just crossed the Mississippi at Hastings, MN having come up its west side. Thus we are just north of Hastings.  The track coming in from the left is from the CB&Q's bridge across the St. Croix River where the St. Croix joins the Mississippi just north of Prescott, WI.  (Note: North from that point the Croix River becomes the boarder between Minnesota and Wisconsin.)  The CB&Q came up the east side of the Mississippi.  Both railroads are single track railroads approaching St. Croix Tower from the south.  

This freight, and all northbound trains of both railroads, except local freights that have work, take the Milwaukee's line along the river edge which presents the least northbound grade.  Southbound trains of both railroads use the CB&Q track which is up on the bluff and has steeper northbound grades.  The tracks are jointly dispatched and as a pair.  The Rock Island joins this shared trackage into St. Paul at the next tower north of St. Croix (Newport Tower).  In 1964 this 18-miles stretch of track from here to St. Paul Union Station had 5 operating towers.  I was fortunate to have worked many tricks in one of the five, Oakland Tower, a CB&Q Tower.  St. Croix was a Milwaukee Road Tower.

The second photo show St. Croix Tower.

Andrew Wirth: Actually, the Q was along the river and the MILW was on the bluff. They crossed again at Newport.

Don Bruns: Brings back memories, now it's just a cement slab. Hard to tell from this photo, but, the Milwaukee Road was single track across the Mississippi River and the BN (early 70's) only had single track across the St. Croix River at Prescott, Wis, and was reversed double track after to facilitate no crossover at Burns or St. Croix Tower.

Marty Bernard shared

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