Re: (erielack) Morristown & Erie interchange

[Steven Kay <s.kay4_@_verizon.net>]

Chuck,

I remember spotting up at Paul Jefferies while holding onto 19 cars
including the outbound empties. They had six doors, you could shove two off
the east end and let one hang off the west end without fouling the crossing.
The rest went back across the street to wait their turn at the dock. The six
empties would go back to Morristown.

There were two crossings on the street that went through the Vornado complex
and we sometimes had enough cars to block both crossing sometimes blocking
cars in between them until we were ready to spot up.

The most cars I have shoved over Ridgedale Ave was 13. If there were 11 or
fewer cars we could run around them in Whippany and shove from there. If
there were more than 11 then we had to drop them on the grade between Troy
Hills Road and Algonquin Parkway. That hill was steeper than 3% if I
remember (Al, can you help out here?). With 13 loaded cars, after you bled
off the air, the draft would start rolling before you released all the hand
brakes. It made for a pretty exciting ride.

PJ's had told us they were going to do 2,000 cars per year but it never came
close to that. Most of the product was Gravy Train (appropriate?) dog food
with some paper product. While they started out heavy we began to see trucks
from Railhead Transportation going in and out with containers. It seems the
intermodal salesmen from Conrail took our boxcars away. It was downhill from
there.

Steve
- -- 
Chauffeur to the masses
www.ble272.org




> From: <Charles_Walsh_@_Berlex.com>
> Reply-To: <Charles_Walsh_@_Berlex.com>
> Date: Thu, 19 Oct 2006 06:51:17 -0400
> To: <DLW1155_@_aol.com>
> Cc: <erielack_@_lists.elhts.org>, <erielack-owner@lists.elhts.org>
> Subject: Re: (erielack) Morristown & Erie interchange
> 
> Thanks, Al, for the comprehensive view of Vornado.  I'm curious as to the
> most cars that you can recall ever getting switched in and out of there on
> a given day?  When I worked for Sandoz (the Novartis predecessor in East
> Hanover) I always wondered if Sandoz ever used the M&E for shipments, even
> though they were located about a mile away (from Vornado).
> 
> Chuck
> 
> 
> 
>                  
>              DLW1155_@_aol.com
>                  
>              10/18/2006 08:27                                           To
>              PM                        Charles_Walsh_@_berlex.com
>                                                                         cc
>                                        erielack_@_lists.elhts.org,
>                                        erielack-owner_@_lists.elhts.org
>                                                                    Subject
>                                        Re: (erielack) Morristown & Erie
>                                        interchange
>                  
>                  
>                  
>                  
>                  
>                  
> 
> 
> 
> 
> In a message dated 10/18/2006 8:56:12 AM Eastern Daylight Time,
> Charles_Walsh_@_Berlex.com writes:
> 
> 
>  take it that this meant that Ridgedale Avenue must have been blocked a
>  good portion of the time.
> 
> 
> No, Ridgedale Avenue was rarely blocked as there was ample room to do the
> switching within the complex but switiching across the road through the
> complex tied thoings up a lot and made headaches for the crew. After
> Vornado exited the discount store business various companies rented
> different buildings with some receiveing rail shipments but not all. The
> building closest to Ridgedale Ave. saw very limited use under Vorando
> receiving only an occasional load of rubber tires or automotive batteries.
> After the closing of Vorando's Two Guys stores Paper Mart, Inc. bought this
> building and has never used rail. The longest tenured tenent was Paul
> Jefferies Warehouse, Inc., which leased the third building and got the bulk
> of the inbound cars. Products included bagged dog food and disposable
> diapers plus a few other things. A lawn chemical company and one other
> warehosuing firm occupied the building across from Paul Jefferies and got a
> few cars, also. Can't recall their names at the moment. Another firm
> superceded Paul Jefferies but high rents eventually forced all to relocate.
> Two very large boilers destined for Novartis on Rte 10 were the last
> revenue loads handled there as far as I know. They came in shortly before I
> left the M&E in 1995.
> 
> Al Holleuffer
> 
> 
> 
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