The P&WV Hi-Line

[PWV101]

With gasoline prices again reaching the point of being ridiculous,
the time has come to curtail road trips in favor of again focusing
time on the rails near home.
Growing up in Bethel Park in the late 1960's and early 10970's,
I was lucky. From our home on Marilynn Drive, the main tack of
the Pittsburgh & West Virginia crossed the Lick Run Valley behind
our home on a high fill, and as discussed before, most train
movements past our home rattled windows and dishes as locomotive
consists did their best in hauling tonnage up and down that hill
through a part of town known as Horning.
Horning was a old Pittsburgh Terminal coal mining community and
located but a mile from home. The exact date Horning closed
long escapes me, but many years later, some remains of Horning
still remain. Part of the concrete tipple stands in the trees behind
the junk yard, surrounded front and back by spoil piles of slate
the came from the mine.
The mid-sized 3,147 foot passing siding at Horning as well as the
three mine tracks were retired in 1980.
Horning was a neat little out of the way location on the bustling
Connellsville District of Norfolk & Westerns - Pittsburgh Division.
That lengthy name was fancy...and a replacement Title for the
now merged Pittsburgh & West Virginia that the N&W, by many
accounts, had to lease in 1964.
As a young boy in the early 1970's myself and a few friends from
our new neighborhood often raced hotshot N&W freights to
Willis road crossing at the West End of Horning so as to listen and
with close up and personal first hand accounts the passing of those
mile long mixed freight trains.
The bicycle ride to Willis road crossing often consumed only minutes
from out neighborhood.
From the distant warning of locomotive air horns passing through
Castle Shannon 2 miles to the West...or the short notice of westbounds
blasting through Bruceton...the bicycle ride was a similiar high speed
adventure for young boys down Marilynn Drive...that sharp left onto
Horning Road...then the high speed jaunt to Willis where the last
25 yards was a hellish climb to the road crossing where flashing railroad
crossing lights and bell warned motorists to STOP.
The West End of Horning was complete with CTC Home Signals controled
by the Rook Train Dispatcher.
As youths, we often spent hours at Willis Road waiting...watching...and
for me tape recording train movements.

Today in 2007, life in and around Horning has changed.
No longer can you expect to see upwards of 6 through train movements
through Horning. The grain trains, the Belt Locals, the occasional iron ore
trains, the Clairton Locals, grain empty trains are all gone.
The Centralized Traffic Control Signals have been retired.
The locomotive consists...lashups of 3-4 & 5 unit consists of first
generation
locomotives are gone.
Those wonderful all Western Maryland lashups...are gone.
My 35 years of visiting Horning has seen its fair share of change.
And this trip back through time, is time without trains...
What makes Horning so Special is the physical characteristics of the
right of way. As we look through the lens of time, we see a right of way
that twists and turns and climbs through the valley along Lick Run
to Longview.
From the former location of the Brownsville Road Water Tank,
located only a few feet from Bridge 43.75, we see the residential area
that was often flooded by a leaking railroad water tank as this rail line
attempts to make a horseshoe curve in its climb to Longview. Looking
directly above the chimney of a residents home, there is the railroad
after making a hard left as it passed Mile Post 44.
From trackside, looking west from Mile Post 44, the railroad twists and
turns coming into the East End of Horning. Gradient in and around
Mile Post 44 is a mere 0.88 percent. This grade actually began 4 miles
east, at Pierce Mile Post 39.8 were it bottoms out just east of the
Clairton Branch Main Track Switch. Coming west out of Pierce, the
grade is a even 1.00 percent for the first three-quarters of a mile.
Coming into Mile Post 41 Westbound, the ascending grade lessens to
0.45 percent for the next mile, then coming into Bruceton, 0.88
percent ascending over the B&O and past the Station for another
2 miles. At Mile Post 45, the westward ascending grade changes to
1.16 percent for the next mile which takes the climb well beyond
Longview Station near Mile Post 46.
Another unique characteristic of this rail line is its rail size.
A spalttering of 112 and 115 pound jointed rail poured in the 1940's
at the Carnegie Works of USS. Jointed rail is a nightmare to maintenance
of way folks. Mud holes develop creating low joints from tonnage trains
and tamping is a routine must. If not, cars start rocking often resulting
in slow orders or derailments.
Another characteristic of joint rail is the need for bond wires. Bond wires
are the life line of the Centralized Traffic Control Signals once in use on
this rail line. Bond wires kept track circuts intact and if a rail broke or
a
track joint seperated, the circut opened and the signals went down.
Stop and Stay Signals were talked by while signal maintainers searched
for the problem. Bond wires and track circuts became a important key
in the safe opeartion of freight trains.

Today, use of bond wires is restricted to crossing circuts.
Proceeding further West into the heart of Horning just beyond the
location of the concrete remains of Pittsburgh Terminals Tipple is that
notorious "S" curve that ends near Willis Road Crossing. The track chart
reports its as a 6 degree right turn...then a 6 degree left on its westward
approach.
Many photographs of passing trains were made inside this S curve.
Once such event that I always think about when walking the curve
is a time in 1976, Engineer T. Rolins coming west on a N&W Local,
two Western Maryland red & white GP-35's...moving along at a decent
speed, but those 2 '35's were slipping the whole time while in my
presence as the throttle was no doubt in the company notch in the climb
to Longview with tonnage.
Further West was Willis Road crossing where many tape recordings were
made in the early 1970's. N&W power often lead the way for most trains,
but on occasion, Western Maryland locomotives were recorded with their
wonderful air horns. Another fond rememberance from the early 1970's was
a N&W westbound one afternoon. With tape recorder on, the crossings
bells were ringing as EMD Locomotives under heavy load came out of the
S curve. Leading the train this day was a Western Maryland GP-40 with
3 WM "F" units trailing. That recording sends chills up your spine as the
locomotives were under heavy load and probably down to 15 or so MPH
in their ascent of Horning. Rail joints recorded after the locomotive
consist
passed and those GM horses were out of tape recording range illustrates
a slow cadence of wheels on rail joints. In my opinion, that 4 unit consist
of Western Maryland power was right at his tonnage rating for Horning.
I'm certain, if it was raining or snowing, that train would of stalled in
my presence.

Closing out todays visit to Horning, we see Heartland Homes claiming the
slate piles from the Pittsburgh Terminal mine. In another years time,
the remnants of the slate piles will forever be lost in a sea of new homes
built off Willis Road on the south side of the railroad. As a young boy,
we often bicycled the trails off road motorcycles and Pittsburgh Terminal
created.
Times have really changed at Horning.
35 years ago, as a youngboy I would of never believed how much this
rail road was gonna change and luckily much of those early day memories
were placed on film alongside those tape recordings.

35 years later, adrenlin still pumps when unusual train movements return
to Horning, as I stand trackside with camera in hand...recording...and
remembering
how it once was... at Horning...
GPS

[Fla. Mike]

Thanks Gene, fo a well written and well remembered area and time! You did not mention the "slang" name of Horning while I was in the Baldwin-Whitehall School System, "The Patch". When you look at your shots of Willis Rd. all these years later it is hard to see th evidence of the switch and a second track! Also those Heartland homes built next to the old mine tallings and the W&LE do not look to be worth 200,000.00 and up but I bet none are lower than that! Now if you had that home development about 1959, with the busy P&WV, the mine, and related dust it would be considered "other side of the tracks"! Also by those pictures, will spring ever come to that area?

[Longview Station]

Fla. Mike;
That story consumed 6 hours of time,
2 hours in walking around and the balance working
the images and typing. I left out alot and could of
made it much longer, but I simply ran out of time.
I could of included some images of trains in the
siding, with one lovely scene of a red & white WM
GP-35 taking siding at the West End with the GRM,
which was the local to Fox Grocery, taken from the
crossing...and the caboose passing a long hood leading
N&W SD-40-2 stopped on the main at the crossing.
Lots of neat stuff of a neat railroad surprisingly 30+
years ago today!
I have photos of Willis Road all torn up from the 1980's
when N&W redid the crossing and closed it for a week.
As a boy, one remembrance was bicycling down to Willis,
as a N&W eastbound eased past our house no doubt coming
into a stop & stay at the West End of Horning...and arriving
at Willis, there bigger than day was a black WM F-7 in
the siding waiting for the eastbound with his pilot right
there atthe asphalt. My bicycle rattled when the F-7 whistled
off after the Dwarf went green for departure...and those F-7's
came to life...
So much history and so little time to write about it...
GPS