(
CRJ, search for Calumet;
John Haynes Track Diagram (a link worth noting is
the removal of the interlocking parts);
Pennsy Track Diagram;
Satellite)
NorthAmericanInterlockings:
photo photo diagram profile(National Style A with 96 levers.)
photo
Chicago and Northern Indiana Railroad Interlocking Towers (click the marker for more information)
SC&S =
South Chicago & Southern
(As opposed to
Calumet Park Tower.)
IHB operated the tracks owned by NYC. This was the north part of the
Kankakee Belt, which was the north part of the Big Four Cairo or Egyptian Line. (Big Four was also owned by NYC.)
Since this is from a closed group, I include all of Mike's comment:
Calumet Junction The junction is in the confusingly laid out city of East Chicago, Indiana; don't try to explore the area without a map. The name also causes confusion. This crossing is sometimes mistaken for Calumet Park Junction in Illinois.The north-south Kankakee Line here is crossed by CSX's B&OCT busy double track main line, which parallels Chicago Avenue. Just north of the junction is IHB's Michigan Avenue Yard, which serves the mills and factories along Lake Michigan. Entering the junction from the southeast is the Whiting branch of Canadian National's Elgin, Joliet & Eastern. The track crosses CSX and IHB, runs along the west side of Michigan Avenue Yard and then heads north to the industrial area near the lake. IHB has trackage rights on the Whiting Branch north of the yard.The CSX line is by far the busiest with over 60 trains a day. Besides IHB transfers, the Kankakee Line also features road trains of NS and Canadian Pacific. A typical day on the Kankakee sees 20 to 25 trains, about equally divided between transfers and road trains. The CN/EJE branch sees only occasional traffic. Calumet tower was the last active interlocker in Indiana. It was shut down in March, 2013, and demolished a month later.The junction is located just north of Chicago Avenue and just east of Kennedy Avenue. The southwest quadrant area is accessible from Chicago Avenue and enables you to stay clear of IHB property. It offers some nice photo opportunities in the afternoon. Calumet is a good spot for trains, but while the neighborhood is not dangerous, a little caution is still advisable.
We took calumet apart and its contents were saved for Grasselli Tower.
I'm glad I saved a satellite image because by the Summer of 2018 the image has been updated and the tower is no longer there. The tracks running up-and-down on the left of the images are the CSX/B&OCT. The single track across the top is the CN/EJ&E. The double track along the bottom is the IHB operated NYC Kankakee Belt. The IHB crosses the EJ&E just north of here.
Update:
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Chuck Roth posted
What we have here is Calumet Tower in East Chicago In. I'm going to guess as to when I took it in 1995.
Chuck Roth Does anyone out there remember the proximity of the tower in relation to the tracks? |
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Goblal Earth, Apr 2, 2013 It was gone by Apr 30, 2015
Dennis DeBruler commented on Chuck's post
I've never seen the tower, but this Apr 2, 2013, Google Earth extract shows it was south of the B&OCT tracks and between the NS/IHB/Kankakee Belt and CN/EJ&E.tracks. So your photo is looking southwest across the B&OCT with the EJ&E on this side of the tower and the IHB in the background. The NS/IHB crosses the CN/EJ&E just north of the B&OCT. The tower was not in the Apr 30, 2015 image. |
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Michael Miller posted
[This post has a lot of comments about the various routings of the bottle trains. Of note is some steel mill ownership information:]
Ean Kahn-Treras: When did Riverdale and the Lakefront steel mill come under common ownership. I know the lake was Youngstown on the west side of the canal and Inland on the east side.
Riverdale was built by....who? Interlake to match up with the facility in South Chicago, or is it a former Republic property?
Michael Miller: Ean Kahn-Treras Riverdale was Interlake/Acme Steel. Their blast furnaces were across the river from Wisconsin Steel.
I want to say thay Acme became part of International Steel Group (ISG) in 2002 along with the remains of LTV which was part of Youngstown. Inland Steel/Ispat Inland joined ISG in 2004. |
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Mike Breski posted
2162, 2163 and 2169 haul a coil train through Calumet Jct
[It is heading southbound on the IHB/NYC/Egyptian Line.] |
As Matt mentioned above,
Hoosier Valley Railroad Museum removed the contents of this tower to restore the
Grasselli Tower. Matt
posted 7 pictures of the dismantling with the comment:
Here is Calumet tower. As the signal guy for Hoosier Valley Railroad Museum. I made a deal with IHB for our museum to get the guts out of Calumet tower for Grasselli. We moved Grasselli to our museum that IHB donated to us. Grasselli was missing levers and parts , because of a heating system, that was installed by the railroad. We did the gutting in just 3 days.
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Bill Urbanczyk posted
Calumet Tower, East Chicago - 1990 |
John Ryan provided four interior pictures that he took in 2013 including a couple of the interlocking plant on the first floor.:
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Nathan Mackey posted
Shoving back to East Chicago. |
Zachar C. Gillihan posted several photos with the comment:
The 8 Lever section that I was able to save from Calumet has been moved to ATT&NW RR for its new lease on life as a interactive display which will be in the warehouse and have a deck built on to it, the locking has been re-engineered and will have various signals setup around it that will light up when you throw the correct levers. I think this will be a neat display and want to thank: Mike Walsh, Thomas Heil, Brad George, and Jake Horn for helping take it apart and move it to the railroad and rebuilding it.
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Here is another collection of photos Matt Lasayko provided as comments on a
posting of the 3-day salvage operation of parts for the Hoosier Valley museum. "
We managed to pull all the levers/rocker plates, pivots, rollers, timers, lever lock outs, relays, and misc hardware in 3 days."
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Mark Llanuza posted
EJ&E at Calumet tower |
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Joe Usselman posted
The bottle train passing Calumet tower while the J's WSW1 waits on the Whiting branch in 2008. |
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John DeWit Woodlock II posted
CNW 8804,UP 8022 @ Calumet Tower-East Chicago,IN 06 SEP 99.
Heading compass south on the IHB operated NYC Kankakee Belt. I presume that is timecard west. I assume it is a runthrough rather than a transfer. But I wonder how it got here from Proviso, and where is it going? |
John DeWit Woolock II
posted two photos with the comment: "
UP 9218,NS 8604,KC 666 @ Calumet Tower-East Chicago,IN 18 AUG 00."
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Nick Hart posted
A train I've always enjoyed shooting around Chicagoland is the "Bottle Train." It takes hot, molten steel back and forth between the Arcelor Mittal plants in Riverdale, IL and East Chicago, IN., along IHB's Mainline.
On July 28th, 2012 the train is seen heading south by Calumet Tower in East Chicago. In charge is a high hood NS GP38-2. Calumet Tower was manned until its closure in March of 2013. Sadly, it was demolished the next month. I'm not too sure of 5114's fate, but there's a chance that it's been rebuilt into an Admiral cab. NS sold a few of these units as well. |
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Joe Usselman posted
Since the arrival of the six axle gensets the three SD20's rarely leave Gibson yard. Here in early 2015 was one of the few times I've seen do so. Here 2924 is passing through Calumet junction with a Pet coke train out of Whiting.
Who and where is the consignee of the petcoke?
Thanks for identifying the cargo as petcoke. Are those hoppers built for petcoke or are they coal hoppers?
As i understand, a significant quantity of the BP petcoke makes its way via the IHB wolf lake branch to the NS (former SC&S - Bernice Cutoff/Calumet River line ) to a transfer facility at 108th and the Calumet River..
Have seen UP power on this run on multiple occasions... |
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Nick Hart posted
Hammer down! Coming off the Harbison Walker Lead, a pair of Indiana Harbor Belt SW1500's are in charge of 50 coal loads, headed south across the former B&O (CSXT Barr Sub) at Calumet Tower. The train is making way to Calumet Park, where the crew would tie the train down.
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Mtnclimberjoe Rail Photography: "NS molten steel bottle train @ Calumet Junction (East Chicago, IN)
http://www.railpictures.net/photo/670238/"
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Richard S Eule posted
Calumet Tower 7/96 |
Arturo Gross 2019 Flickr (
source) "IHB GP40-2 4013 looks sharp in new black and orange paint leading a train out of Michigan Avenue Yard and across CSX/B&OCT rails at Calumet crossing, East Chicago IN, Sept 14 2019."
Steven W Panek
Columbus Drive (US12) in the background.
Arturo Gross 2019 Flickr (
source) "
Conrail SD40-2R 6972 and mate 6971 (both built as PRR SD40s) were local favorites, they spent alot of the 1990s assigned to steel coil shuttle trains in northern Indiana, here they are rolling out of IHB's Michigan Avenue Yard and crossing CSX/B&OCT rails at Calumet Tower in East Chicago IN, Nov 1998."
Stan Stanovich ...framed the same as I used to frame it Art Gross!!! I don’t recall exactly when the tower was closed and removed. I probably photographed there for the last time between 2009 and 2011. It was perhaps in 2015 while in the process of relaying an mty crude oil train from Between CP507 and CP509 (relieved road crew, train came from the east) to the Gary and Western for eventual loading from a pipeline in the area that I discovered the tower gone and new signals!!!
Steven W Panek Stan Stanovich. IHB Calumet Tower was closed in March 2013 and torn down one month later.
Arturo Gross 1999 Flickr (source)
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