In what seems to becoming an annual tradition, I went down to the Finger Lakes and Southern Tier region of upstate NY to chase one of Norfolk Southern's most elusive locals. H06 makes the run from Gang Mills to Geneva on a Sun-Tue-Thu schedule. The departure time is somewhere between 4 PM and 7 PM, so this train mostly runs under darkness. The exceptions are the occasional mid-day run on Saturday and the 15 hours days which run from late May to mid-day July. This year, I went down to the Gang Mills/Corning area on a warm, sunny day about 11 days ago.
We'll start with a little "pre-game" action. There was plenty of cool older EMD power in the yard at Gang Mills, NY:
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The yard itself was quiet, so I moved east to the wye at CP Gibson... which is on the north side of Corning, NY. I caught several NS trains before H06 arrived. The first was eastbound 38T, which is a joint NS/CP operation.
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The westbound action was 12T, followed by a hi-rail MOW truck.
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The final eastbound train I saw on the Southern Tier Mainline was eastbound 206, which is emerging from underneath the Route 414 overpass in Corning, NY.
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All photos in this post taken by me Sunday 6/10/2012.
206 passed through CP Gibson at 4:30 PM. After it passed, I moved to the north end of the wye, and H06 entered it around 4;45 PM. This is the earliest departure time I've ever seen for H06 on a Sunday.
H06 enters the wye and heads northward on Corning Secondary in Corning, NY:
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The yard in the 3rd photo is Baker Street, which is being expanded due to a sharp increase in local gas traffic.
It was a real treat to have those vintage SD40-2s pulling H06 up the 1% grade north of Corning. The following shots were taken near the top of the grade on the Corning Secondary in Dix, NY:
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All photos in this post were taken by me Sunday 6/10/2012.
The tracks pull away from the main highway north of Dix, so I went down the hill into Watkins Glen for a quick break and then resumed the chase on the west side of Seneca Lake. This was the best lighting I've ever had for the Route 14 crossing:
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Both of the preceding phots taken by me Sunay 6/10/0212 in Himrod, NY.
After that, it was an easy chase as H06 descended down the 1% grade to reach the shore of Seneca Lake. The Corning Secondary runs next to Route 14 for over 10 miles.
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Photo taken by me Sunday 6/10/2012 in Dresden, NY.
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Both of the preceding photos taken by me Sunday 6/10/2012 in Benton, NY.
For the first time ever, I captured H06 entering Geneva in daylight. The rays of the setting sun reflected off the sides of #s 3410 and 3395 as they crossed Lake Avenue.
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All photos in this post taken by me Sunday 6/10/2012 in the City of Geneva, NY.
H06 exists for NS to interchange with the Finger Lakes Railway in Geneva, NY. The latter RR (as I've documented elsewhere on jreb), is a very successful shortline and one of NS's Empire Link partners i uptate NY. After spending the night at a hotel in Geneva, I spent the next day chasing FGLK local HW2 near the south end of Seneca Lake.
HW2 crosses Route 14 at Starkey (NY) in the morning. This is an ex-PRR branch, while the nearby NS Corning Secondary is ex-NYC.
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HW2 crosses South Glenora Road in Glenora, NY.
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Old time railroading... the conductor of HW2 flags the spur leading to the Cargill salt mine in Watkins Glen, NY.
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HW2 runs on the ex-PRR Elmira Branch next to the waterfront in Watkins Glen, NY.
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HW2 approaches Argetsinger Road in woods of Reading, NY. The B23-7 is climbing a 1% grade here with 9 cars in tow.
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HW2 switches at the transfer yard in Himrod, NY to close out the day.
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All photos in this post taken by me Monday 6/11/2012. This was 2 days of fun I hope to repeat at least once... or maybe even twice... next year.