(erielack) UPS Trains

["Paul Brezicki" <doctorpb_@_bellsouth.net>]

I've read the review of ACX-99 operations from Diamond predecessor Erie
Railfan (V4 #2), kindly sent by List member Mike Oravec. A little background
here: Because UPS was EL's biggest customer and had stringent service
requirements, EL kept detailed records of operation of the three primary UPS
trains, 2/NY-100, ACX-99 and CX-99. The records for 1975 and '76, comprising
some 800pp were saved and were to be used for a series of three articles
detailing operations in Jan, 1975. The second article covering 2/NY-100
appeared in V6 #2 of the Diamond, but the CX-99 edition was never published,
to my knowledge. Assuming the records are still accessible, perhaps the
final installment could be done for the Diamond now (and I would be happy to
help out). (Wouldn't that be neat, a series of articles spanning 28 years!)

Back to ACX-99. This TOFC train was established in 1972 to supplement CX-99,
and also to expedite
NY-99 overflow that had been going on NY-97. It had a 3am Cx departure and
7:45am arrival in CO, with a Binghamton p/u and s/o's at Marion and
Huntington. Initially Tues-Thurs, service was expanded the following year to
Tues-Sat. Also in '73 it was switched (like several other trains) to a
Scranton routing and the p/u was also changed to Scranton from Bingo. It
began taking more UPS business off CX-99 as the physical plant deteriorated
and the later train could no longer reliably achieve it's 10am CO arrival;
UPS trailers arriving at Cx by around 2am were loaded on the advance
section.

Once again the daily log is a fascinating look at EL operations. As with
2/100, departure was usually aos, almost an hour in one case, but delays due
to slow orders usually meant late arrival in CO. However unlike 2/100, that
month it managed 7 arrivals aos. Interesting items: one train took a minor
delay at Great Notch waiting on TC-4 to dbl the hill (NY&GL strikes again).
I was also surprised at the size of the Scranton block, often 8-10 cars; I
wonder if some of them came from Portside off ES-99.

One final thought. Since there were two WB "UPS trains" but only one EB, I
wonder if UPS traffic in that lane was predominantly WB. This could have
made EL unique among Eastern roads in having predominantly WB TOFC traffic,
if the other business was reasonably balanced. This might explain the empty
trailers on the SF-100 consist; they were returning to Cx for WB UPS loads.
Comments, anyone?

Paul B


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End of EL List Daily V3 #1805
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