Wheeling & Lake Erie stuff

[Bellevue_Guy]

Talked to a Solae employee today, found out a few things...

They do have their own loco (though he didn't know what kind, other than it's blue and isn't a switch engine)

Pretty much any work done out of their west end (that connects to the Sandusky district) is done by WLE and all the work done out of the east end (that connects into the yard between the old NKP section and the hump bowl) is done by NS.

WLE takes loads from Solae to Land O'Lakes (I'm not sure where) and brings back the empties.

[redside20]

Josh, There is a Land O Lakes Purina feedmill in Orrville Ohio, also there is a Case Farms in Navarre near Massillon where Poultry feed is shipped too. Other grain elevators on the Wheeling is the Town and Country Elevator at Smithville. The Wheeling also delivers flour to the newly built spur on the East side of Norwalk to New Horizons Bakery, and I think the wheat is delivered to the Star of the west Milling Elevator in Kent Ohio

[AARR]

IIRC W&LE has/had a handful of short lane grain traffic moves . Wheat from Heartland to Akron. Corn from Washington to their main yard (interchange with another short line). Soy beans from Heartland to Bellevue. Theres one or two others.

[Bellevue_Guy]

Speaking of grain on the WLE, here's what the Sunrise elevator in Monroeville has to move cars around. They've had this little thing for as long as I can remember and it's normally sitting on their spur up near US 20. Anyone know what kind this is?



Also, according to the Sunrise website the yard capacities for their facilities on the WLE are:
Clarksfield - 103, Monroeville - 27, New Washington - 25

[Bellevue_Guy]

around 7:20 pm I saw a WLE manifest with at least 70 cars head around the Brewster connection into the yard. It had some more of those white Cryo Trans refers, which is something I've seen on every Brester connection train that I've seen since I've been posting on this thread.

Also, right now there is one of those east bound BNSF powder river coal trains sitting on the Lakeshore track with the power just west of Prairie Rd and the end just east of Monroe St. The lead's number was in the 6200's, which would make it an ES44AC. Looked like it didn't have a crew. I wonder if the NS crew that brought it to Bellevue did the New Haven wye turnaround and parked it on the Lakeshore and that it's now just waiting for a WLE crew to take it from there.

[Ribbon Rail]

The Monroeville shifter is a GE 25-ton.

[Bellevue_Guy]

Thanks.

Here are a couple quick pics of the Hartland Terminal. This little yard east of Norwalk has 7-8 tracks and is about 2000 feet long.





Earlier today one of their Hi-railers was stopped on the mainline near Bauer Rd and a guy was looking at the Yeomans/Lakeshore swtich

The Wheeling also delivers flour to the newly built spur on the East side of Norwalk to New Horizons Bakery

Drove past that today, interesting setup with it being on the opposite side of the road from the plant. According to a newspaper article I found they blow the flour through a 325 foot underground pipe.

[redside20]

Also Berry Plastics receives cars of plastic pellets and there is a Sunrise Crop Service Agro facility on Greenwich-Milan Town Line Road between Hartland Yard and Norwalk that receives Ag chemicals.


http://wikimapia.org/#lat=41.2248236&lo ... 18&l=0&m=h

Berry Plastics in Monroeville
http://wikimapia.org/#lat=41.2432577&lo ... 18&l=0&m=h

[redside20]

Looking at the Carey Sub between Carey and Spencer, there is a Agro dealer on the far west side of Sycamore that gets tanks of what looks to be ammonia
http://wikimapia.org/#lat=40.9568911&lo ... 19&l=0&m=h

Another Agro place west of Plymouth that gets tanks
http://wikimapia.org/#lat=40.9824616&lo ... 18&l=0&m=h

Just west of Chatfield, in the little flyspeck hamlet of Lemert looks to an elevator with a spur but looks to be unused
http://wikimapia.org/#lat=40.9572152&lo ... 19&l=0&m=h
The bulk of the traffic originates in Carey at the Limestone quarries or in the form of traffic from CSX connection

[Bellevue_Guy]

An EB manifest from the yard with 78 cars at Prairie Rd. Mostly covered hoppers along with some tanks, boxes, gondolas, 4 cryo trans referes and 1 loaded log car. I wasn't planning on taking any pics, but then I saw the power, so I used the only thing I had available, which was my cell phone.



On the left is the new distant signal I mentioned before



As the train was approaching on the Brewster track an NS employee was walking EB on the Lakeshore track pushing a surveyor's wheel down one of the rails. He stopped measuring at Prairie Rd, which is where his truck was parked.

[Bellevue_Guy]

An east bound 57 car manifest from Toledo finished backing from the Fostoria district onto the Sandusky district at 9:45 tonight, then proceeded forward at 10:05 and went around the Lakeshore connection out of town.

Lead by WLE 6347 (SD40-2 in EMB blue), WLE 302 (GP40-3 in Rio Grande paint) and WLE 300 (GP40-3 that has the former UP yellow portion painted black.) Consist was a pretty even mix of tanks, covered hoppers, gons, loaded lumber cars and boxes.

[AARR]

...loaded lumber cars and boxes.

I find it interesting that loaded lumber cars are traveling east toward Toledo. Does W&LE have a lumber mill that it serves?

[Bellevue_Guy]

East bound from Toledo.
According to their website, WLE services lumber transloading facilities at Orrville and Navarre: http://www.wlerwy.com/index.php/lumber/

Also, all the "loaded lumber cars" I've mentioned on here have been of the "covered in white plastic on center beam flat car" variety. There was also one car loaded with logs I mentioned above. All of the lumber traffic that I have seen was heading east, both from Toledo and from the NS yard. I'm not sure if they ever have any lumber traffic heading west toward Toledo, mainly because I haven't been lucky enough yet to catch a Toledo bound train in motion since I've been posting on this site.

[AARR]

Nvm - I misunderstood your original post. I understand where the loaded lumber cars are heading too now. W&LE also servies a large Home Depot distribution center east of Cleveland (Solon?).

[redside20]

There is also a Graves Lumber facility in Copley just west of Akron
http://wikimapia.org/#lat=41.1022628&lo ... 18&l=0&m=b

Here is a there website. Also in the vicinity of Graves Lumber along with Multibase Plastics (Dow Corning)
http://graveslumber.com/

Just to the east of there is Allied Corp which makes Asphalt Products and PVS Chemical which does Hydrochloric and Sulfuric acid blending.
http://wikimapia.org/#lat=41.0993887&lo ... 16&l=0&m=b

[Bellevue_Guy]

One thing I love about living in Bellevue, any simple trip can turn into a little railfan adventure. I was heading west on US 20 toward downtown and saw that a train was going south across the underpass and at first didn't think much of it. Then I saw one of those white CryoTrans refers go by, which tipped me off that it might be a Wheeling, so I turned at McKim to check it out.

It was indeed a Wheeling heading east around the Brewster connection, so I decided to watch it go by at the Center St crossing. Then something kinda odd happened, after about 15 cars had gone by it slowed to a crawl, stopped for a couple minutes, then started backing up. It continued backing, cleared the crossing and didn't stop until the power was back at the Harkness St signals at the beginning of the yard. This was about 1:20 pm

So I continued on and accomplished the errand I had originally set out to do. Then as I was on my way back I spotted the Wheeling moving forward again toward the Brewster connection. So I drove to Orchard St, parked at Reservoir #3 parking lot and walked around the Res to the part that parallels the track and waited for it to arrive. Then when the train got about even with the water treatment plant the darn thing stopped and started backing up again! It continued backwards around the Brewster connection and out of sight at about 1:40.

Since I was now up on the reservoir and the weather was nice I decided to walk some laps for a while and see if it came back. It didn't take too long, around 2:00 it showed up again and this time it continued past me. I didn't have my camera, so I grabbed a coupe pics with my cell phone





I counted 127 cars. It had the usual assortment of tanks, covered hoppers, lumber cars and CryoTrans refers. A couple interesting things were an old looking Texas Mexican Railway boxcar, a blue boxcar that said "Big Blue" in yellow script, and 9 white AEX hoppers at the very end that looked pretty beat up.

Then after the last cars went by me the train stopped yet again, with the end of the train having cleared the reservoir area by about one hundred yards. I finished walking around the res, then drove ahead to see where the power was.

As I approached Prairie Rd I was surprised to see that the crossing was clear. Turns out they had cut of a portion of the train and kept going. About 30 cars were left behind between Prairie Rd and the reservoir, mostly covered hoppers plus 3 of the refers and the white hoppers. I could see the rest of the train off in the distance proceeding east.

[Ribbon Rail]

For what it’s worth, anyone ever seen that really neat GE 2-motor at the elevator in Clarkfield, OH. It’s painted just like the W&LE locos.

The owner/manager told me back in 2006 that he likes that scheme and wanted it to match the railroad that serves them.

[Bellevue_Guy]

WLE 110 (GP35-3) and one of the gray SD40-2's took 32 covered hoppers to Solae today.

[Bellevue_Guy]

Here's one of those BNSF coal trains, sitting facing EB on the Brewster track. I've never seen one sit there, they're always on the Lakeshore track like any other Toledo traffic.



Perhaps this EB manifest on the Lakeshore track was the reason for putting the BNSF over there on the Brewster...

[Bellevue_Guy]

Saw some nice WLE action packed into a half hour span tonight.

Around 8:50pm I was walking down Monroe St and from a distance could see that a WLE train was pulling westbound around the Lakeshore connection and around the New Haven connection to the Fostoria district. Then it stopped and sat for a bit, and I could see the FRED flashing near the new 269 overpass. Then it backed up a little bit and stopped again, this time with the end near the Lakeshore connection switch, and sat there for several minutes.

Then at 8:58pm an NS manifest lead by NS 9735 came in from the Toledo district and into the yard.

At 9:06pm, after the NS train had cleared the WLE continued backing and went up the Sandusky district likely heading to Solae. It had 23 covered hoppers and 1 tank, with WLE 6356 & 6349 for power.

Very soon after that a train on the Sandusky district out at countyline rd brightened it's lights and started moving. This turned out to be the KL94 that MDH mentioned this afternoon on the Rio Grande unit thread, and it did indeed have WLE 6354 at the point, along with WLE 6350. It went east bound around the Lakeshore connection at 9:14pm and had 60 cars, mostly covered hoppers and tanks with a few lumber cars, a couple boxcars and a gondola.