Florence Avenue Overpass

Author: Kyle Montgomery
Category: History Railroads:

The other day I was down in Cincinnati and got a chance to photograph this CL&N overpass. This was part of the track that swept down the 3% grade from Norwood to Cincinnati down the Deer Creek Valley. It crosses Florence Ave shortly before entering the grounds of the old Baldwin Piano plant. Today the factory has been remodeled into an office complex, but the ROW of the CL&N is still visible.

The actual overpass itself is gone. Looking at the supports it would have been a major clearance problem on the northbound side of the road. Here is a shot of the wooden supports leading up to it. I took this photograph looking through a chain-link fence. The fence looked easy enough to crawl under, but being as I’m not one for trespass I kept my distance. I wasn’t able to get any closer from the other sides.

According to my father, who works nearby, recently there was some construction in the area and an even better view of the trestle was availible from the other side. He said that he was surprised they didn’t end up tearing it down then. Instead he said they went through some trouble to keep away from the property, almost as if they didn’t own it.

That’s when I remembered they did, in fact, not own it. Most of the CL&N Right-of-Way leading into the city was purchased by the South West Ohio Regional Transit Board (SORTA). As far as I know, they still own it. It was looked at as a possible ROW for a future light-rail system. When this was defeated as part of the 2002 “Metro Moves” initiative, this plan was shelved.

The CL&N might not even be used as a light rail route. The main problem being that the Oak Street Tunnel is limited to one track.

Here’s another couple shots of the remains of the overpass. 71 was constructed in 1969 and was on a similar route but separate from the CL&N ROW. Trains last used this track in the early 1970′s before the Pennsylvania abandoned the Court Street freight station and their operations in the Deer Creek Valley. It’s remarkable that much of the wood in that trestle still survives.


Much of what’s left along this route is overgrown and fences kept me from doing much investigation. The last shot I have is a tie that I found thrown off to the side.

It’s important to capture these landmarks of railroad history while there is still time. One never knows when, like the elevator in Mason, they will suddenly disappear and be gone forever.

CL&N Layout Plan

Author: Kyle Montgomery
Category: Model Railroad Railroads:

After a long wait and many failed designs, I’ve finally come up with a solid track plan for the CL&N in my basement. This is my 25th major design and one of many hundreds of minor tweaks. It’s taken a long time to come to this point.

While not quite as exciting as a garage layout, this plan manages to compress a good deal of Lebanon in my limited 5×11 space.

I really like this design because of the flowing edges. It’s going to be a challenge to build but I believe the result will be worth it. This design allows for a minimum radius of 24 inches. That will allow me to run pretty much any type of passenger car. With the early era I’m going for (early 1920′s) most of the trains will be short and thus will look good on the mainline.

For a quick tour we’ll start in the South Staging, representing Cincinnati and other points along the south end of the line. For operation I will be modeling the north end of the commuter trains (they will be turning around in Lebanon) and locals to switch the Lebanon industries. The staging yard also includes a runaround track similar to the runaround in Mason. It has an engine pocket at the end to allow some flexibility. I was unable to fit a wye into the plan like I originally wanted to in order to allow my staging to represent both ends of the line. It was a necessary compromise to fit everything in.

When operating the line I would run around the loop once in order to represent the journey into Lebanon. Then I would proceed from the south into Lebanon yard. The yard isn’t completely prototypical. I switched some of the tracks around to make operation go a little smoother. I still managed to include the runaround, but a put some of the track in the road to make a longer run. For industries I included most of the major ones by flipping the tracks around a bit. I also moved the turntable closer to the yard in order to fit it on the plan. The small surface turntable should be interesting to model.

Moving across Broadway I included room for the Lebanon Station as well as one team track. Unfortunately I was unable to include the complicated track work around the shoe factory and the sharp spur into the elevator. Instead I have a much simpler arrangement with the spur to the feed store tucked into the corner.

Around Main Street I left room for some houses to represent the actual ‘town’ part of Lebanon. The Bridge Company isn’t in quite the right place but I still managed to put in the long private siding to it. I also hope to put some of the hills around the area.

Finally we come to the long run in the front of the layout. This is the scenic highlight, including some of the rural fields and the steel truss bridge over the Turtle Creek. It’s going to me a challenge to kit bash a bridge that looks correct the the result will be well worth it. The front should be the focal point when you enter the room from the door to the left.

The track level for this layout will be around 54″. This is necessary to fit the staging shelf over my father’s layout. The height also has the side-effect of making the duck-under to the middle less of one. I have never had a tall layout before so that should be interesting. I plan also to use L-girder construction for the first time.

Overall I think this future layout manages to give a good representation of the CL&N in a limited space, as well as provide reasonable operation for the era. Any comments or suggestions?

Paint Job

Author: Kyle Montgomery
Category: News Railroads:


If you’ve seen the LM&M train lately you may have noticed a small change. The observant among us will be able to tell the car numbers and car names have been repainted. The new white paint really stands out. According to Engineer Bob Zoellner, the areas that could be reached from the ground were recently touched up. This goes for every coach but the Mason car. It needs some more paint job work. That car was vandalized by graffiti while on a run in downtown Cincinnati.

But good for the other cars. It’s nice to see everything maintained so well.

EDIT: I want to clarify. I think, looking at the photos I took, the Mason coach did get some touch-up. I just also wanted to tell the story I recently heard about the graffiti in Cincinnati. It explains a lot why the car looks like this:

Cab Ride on the LM&M

Author: Kyle Montgomery
Category: Photo Essays Railroads: ,

This past week, thanks to an invitation by LM&M Engineer Bob Zoellner, I was afforded an opportunity to ride up front in the cab of GP7 #55. It was a fascinating experience and I would like to take a few moments to share some photos and descriptions of my adventure.

Sunday afternoon I went down to the station around 12:30. There were three rides that day, part of the ‘Railroad Revealed‘. One way at 11, the next one at 1, and the final ride at three. The ride was a half hour each way with a 30 minute layover at LM&M Junction (behind the golf ranch).

Here’s a photo of the 11:00 AM train returning to the station.

Soon I arrived I met Mr. Zoellner for the first time and was invited up to the cab. Having seen this locomotive for years, it was exciting to be in the cab with the engineer and conductor.

Everything in the cab was very functional and had a purpose. There wasn’t much in the way of crew comforts, after all this was a road switcher from the 1950′s. As Mr. Zoellner put it, the cab was designed for a time when people actually had some responsibility. It was up to you to avoid hitting your head on the objects protruding from the wall. There wasn’t the same work-environment lawsuit mentality.

Here’s a shot of the cab.

And here is Engineer Bob Zoellner himself. He was a great guy who clearly loved his job. He was also very knowledgeable about the history of the line and railroading in general. I want to thank him again for a great opportunity and ride.

After we crossed West Street, the real trial began. They asked if I wanted to take a turn at the controls! Naturally I couldn’t say no, but I never really studied closely how a diesel locomotive operated. I knew the basics, but not enough to be a great engineer. Luckily, I had a pro both teaching and making sure I stayed on the tracks.

Driving the locomotive was not as easy as I imagined. There was no throttle setting for the speed we wanted. For tourist operation they try to run exactly at 10mph. This gives a nice 30 minute ride to the grove. This is just as well, as the state of the track means 10mph is the line maximum as it is. Keeping at that speed is another story all together. The speed depends on a combination of the grade, brake application, and throttle and it can get quite complicated. Unlike driving a car, you control all this with your hands. Add in a crossing and it can get real interesting.

Speaking of which, I also got a chance to make safely drive across a grade crossing (the opposite from the way I normally do). I was at the controls when we crossed Glosser Road. This was also difficult, as I had to do the FRA required bell, plus long long short long whistles. The trick to this is making sure to time it just right. The last long whistle should last until you are in the crossing. I didn’t judge our speed quite correctly for this part. As a later found out though, I wasn’t the only rookie on this trip.

When we arrived at the junction we let the passenger disembark, then back the train on a short shove to where the wooden platform was. Here, as part of the “Railroad Revealed” they let people tour the cab as well as view the open side panels on the diesel locomotive. Bob graciously let me stay in the cab as they let families of all ages walk through. Before it even seemed close to thirty minutes, it was time to pull the train back up and prepare to push our way back to Lebanon.

The above is a photo of conductor Jim Carson at the controls for our return trip. Mr. Carson is in his third year working for the LM&M as a conductor. This however, was only his second full-length trip at the controls. He did a good job, but there were times that made me feel a little better about my own engineer shortcomings.

On our way back Mr. Zoellner took the opportunity to explain some more about the line. I got the opportunity to see the remains of a water tower, the remains of a damn built by the Pennsylvania RR, as well as a number of good stories about the way things were back when he started working for the I&O in the early 80′s. Some interesting facts included the oldest rail on the line (a piece is stamped 1890 near the engine barn), the history of the Turtle Creek bridge (a previous wooden bridge burned down in the 1920′s), and I got a nice introduction to how trains are controlled on the Lebanon branch these days. He even let me keep a copy of the track warrent. I’ll try to mix in more of these interesting antidotes in my future posts.

All too soon we were back in Lebanon and my cab ride, like all good things, came to an end. If you’re interested in meeting great railroad people like I did, I believe the LM&M does sell cab ride tickets for a small premium. It is truly an awesome experience and I enjoyed every second of it. And if nothing else, the trip made for a good blog post!

1948 Model Railroader

Author: Kyle Montgomery
Category: Model Railroad

Last Thursday I visited the Ohio State Fair. It was a cool place and fun times were had by all. While I was there I took some time to check out this one barn. It was set up similar to a flea market with people selling everything you didn’t know you needed. Sadly for me, this included very little model train items.

However one booth seemed to have a lot of comics and a lot of older magazines. This included some old back issues of Model Railroader. They ranged from 1948 all the way up to the present day. The oldest issue was January 1948. For one dollar I thought, “Why not?”. It’s interesting to see the state of the hobby in 1948.

The cover starts off with a black and white (like everything else in the magazine) photo of John Allen’s HO 4-4-0. The cover proudly states that 98,000 copies of this issue were printed. The cover price in 1948 dollars was 35 cents.

Inside, immediately one notices the style of the advertisements. They clearly fit the style of the early post-war period. One advertisement for power kits loudly proclaims “The New Electrapack Series for up to three HO Locos.” They also advertise saving money by buying a kit and building the box yourself. A four amp twelve volt kit goes for 15.95. I also noticed the amount of advertisements for O gauge equipment was equal to the HO, and this was reflected in the articles as well. These days O makes a far smaller part of the market.

The Editorial on page seven of the magazine sits as my favorite part of the issue. In it, Frank Taylor discusses the pros and cons of modeling diesels, and how some die hard were still holding out and having nothing to do with them. He goes on to discuss how more and more Class 1 railroads have them, and how diesels are inevitably in the future. He closes the article by commenting on the size of the order backlog as Electromotive, Fairbanks-Morse, and G.M.C.

The other articles in the magazine include scratchbuilding a 10-wheeler locomotive (complete with hand-drawn diagrams), some layout ideas and a track plan (which holds up quite well), and scratchbuilding a union station. The amount of scratchbuilding in general was interesting. It was clearly a different time.

The cover story includes a photo report on the first Gorre & Daphetid RR built by John Allen. This is where I was really disappointed to just have black and white pictures to look at, as it’s a great railroad; especially with a minimum radius of 14 inches.

The rest of the magazine includes the usual tips and trips. Trackside Photos was named Picture Parade. (You could receive two dollars if your photo was included. The magazine is right around 75 pages, but seems to include more text than they do today. Overall, I found the copy interesting and definitely worth the dollar – a lot more than some things at the fair were.

Layout Update

Author: Kyle Montgomery
Category: Model Railroad

While reading the post a link to your layout thread on the Model Railroader forums I realized it had been a couple of months since I last posted pictures of the layout. This is also especially important, as I believe my layout to be approaching its end of days. I’m preparing to take it down in order to build my next layout, which hopefully will be bigger and better.

So in conclusion I haven’t worked on it much, but I still needed to update the picture. This new shot includes the yard, a completed elevator, and the pond. I haven’t been completely happy with this layout, but it’s all I have.

Big Bend Park

Author: Kyle Montgomery
Category: Then and Now Railroads:

You’ve already heard about my adventure following the DL&C line. The trip was a successful research experience, and here is what I did find:

North of Lytle off of East Social Road there is a housing development. In the corner of this development there is a very tiny park called Big Bend Park. I would imagine it was named after the creek in the area. The right-of-way of the Dayton, Lebanon, and Cincinnati went through this park, and I decided to check out what’s left.

I was pleasantly surprised with what I found. The park has a small walking trail built on the old ROW. At first I was able to tell because it was built up higher than the surrounding areas. Eventually we noticed ties that were still in the roadbed. When the trail ends there is a sharp drop off into the neighborhood. Either the roadbed was dub up when the development was built or there was some sort of bridge because the drop off is too sharp to be part of the line. The following picture is looking from the trail into the neighborhood.

This picture is looking down the trail. You can see how well the ROW was preserved.

There were many ties both still in the path and off to the side. I did notice a few spikes still in some of them but I didn’t find any discarded rail or any other metal. I imagine most of the rail was lifted when the line was abandoned in 1979.

There were also a numbers of fills made in the area to raise the line and keep it level. With a nearby creek I imagine this was important for drainage purposes. Here is a photograph of my sister standing on the roadbed.

This is a very short stretch of preserved line. At the end of the park land the ROW disappears into the next field, the path being too overgrown to follow it on. Not a train had passed on this line for nearly 30 years. Yet looking around and walking down this quiet trail it seems that the rail line was abandoned just yesterday.

Sometimes Even the Bravest Warriors Get Stuck

Author: Kyle Montgomery
Category: Updates

So this past week I decided to make a trip up towards Dayton to check out what’s left of parts of the DL&C. It was going to be an adventure, and I left myself the afternoon open to make the trip. Well, it certainly was an adventure, but sometimes these adventures do not always go as planned.

My first stop was a small neighborhood off of US 73. The neighborhood is fairly new, and the ROW crossed it right in the middle. I was interested to see if there was any evidence of it left and I wanted to go before too many homes get built and occupied. For the record, you can tell where it went but there’s not a lot of evidence. I didn’t get any shots — not the point of this story.

After I crossed the ROW I went to turn around. Being the polite guy I am, I decided against turning around in someone’s driveway and instead decided to pull into this house that was still under construction.

Bad idea.

The gravel drive was not only full of big chunks of gravel, but they had yet to be compacted. My truck got stuck and I spent the next hour pushing, swearing, and thinking about ways to get it out. I eventually did using the floor mats under the back wheels. There is, however a lesson in this story.

And no, the lesson is not “don’t go on adventures to find old railroad right-of-ways”. That would be crazy talk. The moral is that sometimes things don’t always go as planned. I still had an adventure though, and it was quite the memory.

Oh, and the trip wasn’t a complete failure either.