Waterloo, IA: IC Roundhouse, Backshop and Icing Platform

William Brown posted
The IC Waterloo, Iowa Roundhouse around 1900. By CC&P times [1985] the Backshop Building at the far left center, the Smoke Stack and the small Roundhouse on the back right was all that was left. An Amazon Postcard cleanup with Photo Shop.

Satellite

What William refers to as the "small roundhouse" still exists. It turns out he is measuring size in terms of the arc size. The 360-degree roundhouse was small in terms of the length of the stalls. The 1963 Historic Aerials has the best view of the engine servicing area when it still had both roundhouses. If you look at 1937 and 1952 as well, you will see that the top roundhouse started with short stalls along the road and was built clockwise as they added longer stalls on the right side and tore down the shorter stalls on the left side.

Update:

Gary Miller posted
Old postcard showing ICRR rail operations in Waterloo, Iowa.

Francisco Lacy Does it have two round houses?
Dennis DeBruler commented on Franciso's comment on Gary's post
It did have. The smaller one would have been the older one. The oldest detail topo map I can find is 1963. By then the older one had been torn down and the newer one had been "downsized" to what we see today.

John W Dodge posted
Wateroo Iowa Illinois Central Roundhouse.
John W Dodge I believe in the 40's..Cliff Downey Roundhouse photos are rare, but photos of car shops from that era are almost non-existant! Thanks for sharing!

Illinois Central Railroad Scrapbook posted
IC's ice dock at Waterloo, IA, photographed April 16, 1919. This photo was taken shortly after the structure was completed but before it was put into service.
Detailed info about construction of the ice dock, with more photos, can be found at https://books.google.com/books…
Dennis DeBruler I've seen more photos of transfer tables than ice docks. Nice find.

Bob Chaparro posted

Action On An Icing Platform

Doug Harding provided this photo.

He commented:

One of my favorite photos showing a meat reefer being iced. You can clearly see the salt box on the deck, next to the leg. Taken in Waterloo IA at the IC ice dock.

My Notes:

Armour meat reefer.

Bob Chaparro

Moderator

Railroad Citrus Industry Modeling Group

https://groups.io/g/RailroadCitrusIndustryModelingGroup

Bob Chaparro posted with the same comment

William Brown posted six photos with the comment: "From 1988 until 1993, I lived in the Waterloo, Iowa area.  I came across this old Postcard of the Illinois Central Shops on the 1900s.  The Satellite Shop shows the Canadian National today.  The Long Grey Buildings on the upper right are Ice Houses for Ice Harvested out of the Cedar River.  It was used for icing Reefers coming from the West.  Only two portions of the right Roundhouse remain."

Brian Lowe: The Ice house serviced both east and west manifests. My father told me that there was a stock pen on the north side of the yards and a sheep pen east on top of the hill at hill top.

William Brown posted again

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Vandalia, IL: Junction Tower: IC (now VRCC) vs. Penn

(Satellite)

Jacob Hortenstine posted
original interlocker at Vandalia Illinois ICRR PRR crossing
Jacob Hortenstine again posted
Vandalia Illinois interlocker IC and PRR crossed early 1900's

The IC line was the original charter line, so it got abandoned in the 1980s except for a short segment to the north which is the VRRC. CSX got the Penn route when Conrail split up. Of the three routes CSX had to St. Louis (B&O, which they severed a year or so ago, and L&N, which they sold as EVWR), this is the only route that CSX still uses across Illinois.

The tower was in the northeast quadrant with the connector track behind it.

See IC facilities for a picture of the buildings in the triangle below the Penn tracks.

1938 Aerial Photo from ILHAP

At photo resolution

Update:  Barry Simich posted two photos with the comment: "Pictures of the Vandalia, IL tower in 1994 (left) and in 1999 (right)."

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Seven Tracks Photography posted

"The Vandalia Railroad"

With the old tower that guarded the Pennsylvania Railroad and Illinois Central's interlocking as their "headquarters," the Vandalia Railroad is a 5.5 mile long shortline owned by Pioneer Railcorp. Their only customer ships plastic and the rest of the line is used for storage cars. Currently on the property, there are two locomotives. The PREX 910 and 104. The 104 is currently for sale as Pioneer is chopping some units off their roster. The 910 is a recent addition that came from the Decatur Junction, another Pioneer property. With the old tower still in place, the SW1200, and the high-nosed GP9, this is a shot that throws you back in time. - 4/24/20

Hi-Res: https://flic.kr/p/2iUG25r
Jackson Vandeventer shared

Noah Haggerty posted
An old wig-wag crossing signal still stands in Vandalia, IL, in the late 1980s. This crossing, once part of the Illinois Central at Main Street, had been abandoned and paved over. Next to it, Vandalia Tower protected the IC and the former PRR, by then Conrail, seen to the left. To the right of the photographer, a tiny shortline serves  a single customer. John & Roger Kujawa Photo, Thomas Dyrek Collection.
Tim Shanahan shared

Harrisburg, IL: Aban/Southern/NYC/Big Four (Egyptian) Yard, Roundhouse, Depot and Freight House

Depot: (Satellite, Hardee's sits on the site of the depot)

Railyard: (Satellite, since the Egyptian line was abandoned, there is nothing left of the yard.)

Roundhouse: (Satellite, the arc of the turntable? According to the bend in US-45, this is about the right location.)

I was surprised how big the yard was until I noticed on the 2005 SPV Map that there was a branch going west of town to some coal mines. I also learned from the map that the Southern Railroad bought the Egyptian route from Penn Central between Olmsted and Mount Carmel. Southern abandoned this route except for a remnant south of Mt. Carmel to the Wabash Mine. And Conrail maintained trackage rights over the spur to the Wabash Mine. The spur to the mine has been abandoned, but NS still supplies coal trains for the spur over the Wabash River to the Duke Energy Power Plant.

Bart Hileman posted seven pictures with the comment: "Harrisburg Illinois on the NYC."

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2, cropped

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Parked on a siding in Harrisburg

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The Egyptian some time in the 1950's

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A colored version of "picture 6."

John Morris posted
Views of New York Central (Big Four) trains in Southern Illinois are comparatively rare. In this faded photo, GP7 No. 5771 is shown here with the "Egyptian" passenger run at the Harrisburg station. Passenger service ended on April 28, 1957, although the line survived into the Conrail era. Other than a bicycle trail, no trace of the line exists today in Harrisburg.

1938 Galatia and 1937 Harrisburg Quads @ 62,500

This was posted as the second picture above, but it is worth repeating.

John Morris posted
New York Central's Big Four at one time maintained a sizable yard in Harrisburg to service the then thriving Southern Illinois coal mines. This view is assumed to be in the late 1940s or early 1950s. Adding to the intrigue is the rare 2,000 HP Fairbanks-Morse H20-44 diesel working the yard. Everything railroad related in this view is gone.
Edward Bridges I believe this image was taken in 1953...
Andrew Roth shared
Harrisburg, IL New York Central yard in approximately in 1953.

John P. Kohlberg posted

CR(NYC) Cairo Branch at Harrisburg, IL.

Michael J. Connor Kodachrome(s).

Ray N Tammy Gunning: I remember this well. It had caught fire in the late 80’s

Edward Bridges commented on the above posting, cropped
It was a hump yard...that picture was taken from the light tower near the hump. Here is a view looking north from the same light tower:

Rex Settlemoir posted
Back in February, Eric Berg posted a photo of the Southbound "Egyptian" arriving in Harrisburg, Illinois behind steam power. This photo of the "Egyptian" arriving in Harrisburg during its final diesel power days was taken by Dr. Louis Marre and appeared in one of David Sweetland's "Lightning Stripes" books.
[He posted a 2007 photo that explains that the Hardee's now occupies the land were the depot sat.]
Raymond Barr posted
It's @9:25 AM, and NYC Train #463, The Egyptian, has arrived in Harrisburg Illinois from Chicago on its run over the Cairo line. Unattributed photos courtesy of the Harrisburg Facebook group.
If you'd like to get dialed in on NYC/Big Four history from Harrisburg on South to Cairo, go to the group Fans of New York Central 's Big Four Lines and look up Rex Settlemoir. His daddy and granddaddy were long time employees on the Cairo Line and recorded much activity in their days.

This town also got hit hard by the 1937 flood.

SouthernIllinoisRailroads [This web page has many more railroad photos from this town.]
Chronicling Illinois
Abraham Lincoln Library and Museum

1938 Aerial Photo from ILHAP

The depot is probably one of the buildings between Walnut and Popular Streets. Picture 4 above was probably the freight house and the building on the west side of the small yard near Gum Street.

Dennis DeBruler commented on a post
I noticed that Big Four had a rather big railyard between Muddy and Harrisburg.
https://clearinghouse.isgs.illinois.edu/.../0bhc01120.jpg

Satellite

The large, double-hump yard was north of town where there is curved "green land" in this satellite image. The roundhouse and engine servicing facilities were west of the two humps in the middle. This building is about where the roundhouse was. There was a smaller yard on the east side of town between Commerce Street and what is now a trail. These would have been their yards until they built the big one north of town.

1938 Aerial Photo from ILHAP

Cliff Wartman posted
Harrisburg IL during 1913 flood. Yard office and freight house area.

Rex Settlemoir posted
This is the NYC/Big 4 passenger depot at Harrisburg Illinois during the 1937 flood. I suspect that the "Egyptian" turned at Mt. Carmel until the flood waters receded and the Cairo line was put back into service around Harrisburg.
Art Wallis In 1937 the main part of the train still operated to and from Evansville, so I suspect you're right.

Dave Cantrell posted two photos with the comment:

Harrisburg, IL, NYC/Big 4 line during 1937 flood.
Chronicling Illinois
Shared with permission
Henry Horner Collection
Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum

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[Note how deep the water is even though it is quite a ways from the Middle Fork Saline River. The land must be really flat and a lot of the town went under water.]

David Cantrell posted

Harrisburg, IL railroad yard, can see roundhouse in distance.

1.26.1937 during Ohio River Flood

--National Archives

David Cantrell posted four photos with the comment: "Harrisburg, IL Big 4 Railroad Yard during 1937 flood, 1938, 1956, and 1993."

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The nearby Big Four bridge failed because piers were shoved over.

12 photos

Neilson Junction: BNSF/CB&Q vs. UP/C&EI

(Satellite)

Normally, the title would begin with the town that the junction is in. But southern Illinois is such a wilderness, that two railroads joined, but no town ever developed at that junction.

Not only is the West Vienna Tower gone, the junction is gone because UP has abandoned all of its C&EI trackage that was south of there including a bridge I studied. It now uses the BNSF route to access the Joppa Power Plant branch.

Edward Bridges posted three pictures with the comment:

Neilson Junction, junction point of the Union Pacific's former Chicago & Eastern Illinois with the BNSF's former Chicago, Burlington & Quincy. This junction is 8 miles south of Marion, Illinois. This junction was unique because from 1911-1989, it was guarded entirely by semaphore signals.
The tower was built in 1911 by the C&EI, demolished by UP in 1989. Between myself and two other friends, we saved quite a few things from this tower, to include both signs, plant timer, number fobs from all the levers as well as the framed manipulation (shown in last image). I was given the manipulation by the fellow who was the signal foreman who closed the tower almost 25 years after he took it down from the tower when he saw this picture.
First two images by Edward Bridges, last image by the late Brian Shafer.

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1938 Aerial Photo from ILHAP

The C&EI is on the east side and was easy to find because of the fresh ballast. The CB&Q on the west side was harder to find because its grey ballast blends in with the farm fields. I put a red rectangle around the tower's location.

Stephen N. Brannon posted
Here is C&EI Neilson Tower out in the "boonies" several miles south of Marion, Illinois where the CB&Q line south from Centralia and Herrin to Metropolis and via the jointly owned P&I to Paducah, Kentucky gained trackage rights on the C&EI 15.8 miles south to WV Tower West Vienna. Photo looks southward along the CB&Q. Switch was to the siding where helper engines sometimes helped heavy soundbound CB&Q coal trains over Goreville Hill. CB&Q was a major supplier of coal for the TVA power plant just across the Metropolis Bridge over the Ohio River at Chiles, Kentucky. C&EI on the other side of the Tower. CB&Q and C&EI also exchanged coal loads and empties at Goreville since C&EI served the EEI power plant at Joppa, Illinois.
Richard Fiedler shared

Edward Bridges commented on Richard's share
I happen to own the old manipulation board from Neilson Junction tower, along with the foot pedal from underneath the desk among other artifacts from that tower when it was demolished in April 1989.
[If you know what a "manipulation board" is, please leave a comment.]
Chicago & Eastern Illinois Railroad Historical Society shared