B&P = Buffalo & Pittsburgh
Andrew Costel posted five photos with the comment: "The old Pittsburgh-Shawmut railroad. This section of the shawmut crosses above the Armstrong county rail to trail (former Allegheny valley RR) in templeton, PA. From what I read half this line was abandoned in 1996. The section where these photos were taken was abandoned in 2012 when the coal power plant was shut down. All the coal gondolas are still left behind. The bridge was super sketchy to walk across because almost all of the wooden boards were rotted."
Shane Rosencrance: Those are covered hoppers being stored by the B&P. The line is still in service from Freeport to the Allegheny River bridge (what you're standing on) though that portion from the powerplant to Limestone (where the connection to the BPRR mainline at Mosgrove shoots off) is solely used for car storage.
Also the P&S was sold the B&P in '96, the mainline between Colwell and Rayard wasn't mothballed until 2000 when the large coal loader in Dora shut down and abandoned in the early 2000s. Around 2014 they pulled the rails from Mahoning yard down to Mahoning tunnel, just north of this bridge.
Tim Shanahan shared
Marc Fechtner: Why would the cars just be left to rot, why not scrapped?
Dennis DeBruler: Marc Fechtner The comments on the original post explain that these are new "4-bay cars with pneumatic outlets, for plastic pellet service." Buffalo & Pittsburgh is storing them on this P&S remnant between their former-B&O mainline through Mosgrove, PA, and the bridge. These SPMX cars have been built and stored in various places in Pennsylvania since 2018 to support Shell's new polyethylene plant at Monaca, PA.
Marc Fechtner: Dennis DeBruler didn't see the comments on that. Cool follow up thanks. I worked for bottle making plant for 5 years and procured millions of lbs of PE and PET pellets.
Dennis DeBruler: Marc Fechtner I've noticed that the plastic pellet industry is one of the few industries remaining that is still willing to put up with Class I carload "service." (The forestry industry (paper and lumber) is another.) Grain elevators were forced to give up using railroad service unless they were big enough to load unit trains or their tracks were taken over by a shortline.
Bruno Donohue: Dennis DeBruler probably because many delivery points are to translate facilities unless newer plants designed for unloading unit trains of the pellets.
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| Shane Rosencrance commented on Andrew's post |
The comments on the post provide another piece of the puzzle concerning the B&P. The line north of Freeport was the Pittsburgh and Shawmut.
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| gwrr_bprr via Dennis DeBruler |
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| 1953 Pittsburgh Quad @ 24,000 |
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