Vickers

[jimnorthwood]

The city of Northwood plans to develop a park on newly-donated land in the southwest quadrant of the intersection of Wales and Drouillard Roads. No timetable yet for construction. This is not going to be a railfan park per se, as it will be located across Wales Road from the northwest quadrant where Vickers crossing is located. Still, this will open up access to the area which has been somewhat restricted in recent years. Yours truly had propsed the idea of a park to the Mayor a number of years ago. He liked the idea, but city council did not. But that proposal called for a park in the northwest quadrant, and the city council was concerned about potential liability. So the southwest quadrant is better than nothing. At least if/when the Wales Road overpass is ever built, railfans will still have access to the area near Vickers.

[esprrfan]

That's a better place for it anyhow for pictures. Opps my mistake I read into it that it'd be at the SW corner of the DIAMOND

[MDH]

The city of Northwood plans to develop a park on newly-donated land in the southwest quadrant of the intersection of Wales and Drouillard Roads. No timetable yet for construction.

So you mean South of Wales Rd. in the (currently) farm field between CSX and Drouillard? That's only worth anything if they clear the brush along the CSX ROW... especially if they do the grade separation - then you wouldn't even be able to see much of NS from there... although it may provide a place to park to walk up to the overpass...

So are they ever going to do the grade separation project?

[sd70accsxt700]

Ya that area is not good for anything, as far as railfans are conserned. Like Mike said if and when the grade seperation happens you wont be able to see the NS.

[trainjunkie47]

Speaking of the grade seperation, does anyone know how this is proposed to be accomplished?

Is one set of tracks going to be raised, another set lowered, or a combination of both?

Is the NS going to pass over the CSX, or vise versa?

[MDH]

Speaking of the grade seperation, does anyone know how this is proposed to be accomplished?

Is one set of tracks going to be raised, another set lowered, or a combination of both?

Is the NS going to pass over the CSX, or vise versa?

The grade seperation project "on the books" is to raise Wales Rd over both CSX & NS and re-route Drouillard to connect with Wales East of NS on the North side and more or less where it does now for the South side. Plenty of detail here:

http://www2.dot.state.oh.us/dist2/publi ... /wales.htm

Although note that site hasn't been updated since April 2006 and I think it was originally supposed to have already started by now...

[jimnorthwood]

Future park location is the farm field that is south of Wales, west of Drouillard. Per a talk with the Mayor it is not going to be developed nor promoted as a railfan park per se, unlike Deshler or the much talked about one in Fostoria. This is probably a good thing, as according to someone else's post the TSA has now declared that it is illegal to photograph trains anyway.

The grade separation project is still planned, but unbeknownst to the state and city the federal share of the money that had been allocated for it was diverted to a similar project in the Cleveland area when Congressional redistricting took place following the 2000 census. The folks in Columbus didn't learn of this until a few years after it happened. Then the congressman who represented Wood County, including Northwood, died while in office so for a while there was nobody to push for the project. I don't know if the current congressman has any interest in the grade separation project or not. The state budget deficit is projected to be $7.5 billion by mid-2011 so the grade separation project likely isn't going to be a huge priority in Columbus. The only entity that has its share of the money ready to go is Northwood.