(erielack) Erie Signals

[Wdburt1_@_aol.com]

Jim Gerofsky wrote:
 
> I wonder if an interlocking signal that would use Clear Slow for a  
diverging route 
> would show Restricting if the next signal ahead on that route was Stop  
or Stop and 
> Proceed.  Knowing the Erie, I'll bet that's what it was -- let  'em 
crawl, even if the next 
> signal is a mile away and the machinery knows there's nothing on the  
block itself.  
 
Restricting was used in place of Slow Approach on the Erie.
 
Often, Clear Slow was displayed on a dwarf signal.  Many dwarf  signal 
installations were in locations that did not permit a signal  mast.  Per EL Rule 
290, a constant yellow on a dwarf signal meant  Restricting, not Slow 
Approach.  With the addition of a flasher, the  dwarf could display Rule 283 
Clear Medium (flashing green) or Rule 286  Medium Approach (flashing yellow), 
but there was no provision for Slow  Approach.  It says something about the 
Erie's reluctance to spend money on  flashers (or, even more horrifying, to 
erect bracket masts,  cantilevers, or signal bridges) that for two decades 
dozens of  Medium Speed passing siding exit switches across the railroad 
required  location-specific timetable speed restrictions permitting trains taking 
a  Clear Slow signal to leave the siding at 30 MPH.
 
I'm not sure where the flashing dwarf signals came from, Erie or DL&W,  but 
it's a practical solution.  In contrast, NYC created a  complex system of 
two-arm dwarf signal aspects which was parallel,  but dissimilar, to the 
system of aspects used on high  signals.  Where Erie's standard US&S dwarf used 
a nice big  searchlight-style lens, the NYC-design dwarfs necessarily used 
smaller lenses,  and due to their close proximity to each other they are hard 
to make out at a  distance.  But their real downfall, as I see it, is their 
bewildering  complexity.  Conrail installed some of these dwarf signals  at 
CP-OLEAN.
 


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