FCC to Adjust RR Radio

Author: Kyle Montgomery
Category: News

Like many people interested in railroad operations, I use a radio scanner to listen in on my local railroads. I’m stuck on the Warren County highland, but I can still get the Indiana and Ohio dispatcher and bits and pieces of Norfolk Southern’s Dayton District. After sunset on some nights I can even get radio from Norfolk Southern’s Sharon Yard. So you can understand that when I hear talk about changes to the railroad band I listen.

According to Railcom the FCC has mandated that the spacing of channels on frequencies from 154-174 Mhz be reduced from 25 KHz separation to 12.5 separation as of January 1, 2013. The railroad band is the part of this spectrum from 160.215 – 161.565 Mhz. Right now the spacing between railroad channels is 15 Mhz. Because of this, the FRA has mandated that all locomotives in run-through and interchange service be able to receive the so called “narrow-band channels” by January 1, 2010.

Generally it shouldn’t be an issue to get these new channels on your scanner, the only exception may be older scanners that are not set up to properly access the new narrower channels. And of course you will have to reprogram, some railroads may be moving channels. The benefit, of course, is going to be more room on the band for more channels. It is unknown how these new channels will be distributed to the railroads at this time. Right now many railroads have multiple channels due to the various mergers and acquisitions in their history,

At any rate, this is still a ways away, but I considered it important news to pass along. To see a chart that describes the possible new channel assignments download the PDF availible here. For a list of current railroad frequencies, including the I&O and other local frequencies check out this list here.

For my latest news links I have a story on Toledo’s Blue Bird and a local museum in Bradford, Ohio.

Photos from the Little Miami

Author: Kyle Montgomery
Category: Then and Now Railroads:

I’ve been doing some biking on the Little Miami Scenic Trail, which was built on the abandoned Right-of-Way of the Little Miami Railroad. The Little Miami Railroad was one of the earliest railroads built in the state and the first railroad into Cincinnati. I’m preparing some more extensive articles for later in the summer about the trail, its history, and interesting railroad legacies still viewable from the path, but in the meantime I wanted to share a couple shots I took while out riding today.


Watch Where You Park

Author: Kyle Montgomery
Category: News Railroads: ,
Photo from News 5.

There was an interesting news story posted earlier in the week about a car that was hit by a train in Hyde Park. The driver of the car, an employee at Busken Bakery, apparently assumed the tracks near his workplace were abandoned. It was a costly mistake, as it just so happened that Norfolk Southern was running a local down that line today. No one was hurt, but the car was crushed up pretty good.

Photo: Idlewild Yard circa 1917.

There’s an obvious lesson in this about assuming railroad lines are abandoned. That assumption can come back to bite you anywhere when you find that it’s not the case. This line was in fact the old Ohio and Northwestern () mainline from Portsmouth into Cincinnati. Here’s a nice map of where the accident took place. This line (originally narrow gauge) interchanged with the at Idlewild. The N&W’s commuter trains would travel down the to Court Street while their long distance trains would use the Little Miami into the PRR’s station downtown.

Photo: The end of the line and the remains of Idlewild Yard. Photo courtesy Cincinnati Traction.

With the CL&N abandoned this line’s importance as a through line diminished significantly. Now it’s open to local traffic through Montgomery Road. There’s still a number of fairly active industries, including one at the very end of the line that gets a great deal of tank car traffic. The local that hit the parked car was transporting cars for this business. There is some nice pictures (including the one above) of this end of the line over at Cincinnati Traction History.

In other news the FRA has a website up with details of Obama’s vision for high speed rail. In non-Ohio Valley but still interesting news I found this article about a house located near a railroad branch line. It would be the perfect house if you enjoyed a daily 7 AM train.

Model Tips and Notes

Author: Kyle Montgomery
Category: Model Railroad

Now that I’m back from school I’ve tried to fit in some time developing the layout in between my shifts at work. Right now I’m working on finishing the backdrop, sanding and leveling my cork, and preparing to start laying track. I was hoping to have some sort of modeling tutorial to post today, but found that nothing really was “tutorial worthy”. Instead I’ve spent most of my time jumping from small job to small job. I did however acquire some tips and photos for these various jobs.

My first major project was attaching 2 inch thick foam insulation on the other side of the room. This formed the basic terrain for Hageman, Stokes, Mason, and South Mason. I used liquid nails to adhere the foam to the plywood benchwork. It’s important to have a foam-safe adhesive in this situation. Below, you can also see the recently installed lighting on my dad’s layout.

Another thing I did was finish the seams in my backdrop. To do this I used joint-compound and a power sander. It’s important to take your time, I used a minimum of two layers of joint-compound. I would sand, then apply the plaster, then sand, apply the second layer, and sand one final time. This left me with a smooth transition to paint over.

I also used the joint-compound for leveling the gaps in my cork around my switches. Once again I had to use two layers, but after sanding this provides a nice smooth surface for my turnouts to sit on. In the photo you can also see the transition to the shorter N-scale height cork.

After sanding everything level, I then used special textured spray paint where my turnouts will be. By doing this I will limit the amount of ballast needed around the turnout points. Less ballast means less problems with stones getting stuck or moved out of place. Here again it is important to cover the foam base around the cork, because the paint will harm the foam.

I look forward to continuing progress on my layout this summer. In closing I will leave you with this video of both my brand new locomotive and the first train to run on my new layout.

News: There’s a very nice article on the Mad River & Nickle Plate Museum in Bellevue. And here is a short article on possible stops for the 3C train.

Bridge Construction

Author: Kyle Montgomery
Category: Model Railroad Railroads: ,

I was downtown yesterday to take some photos and noticed that work is continuing on the bridge over the Turtlecreek just south of Lebanon Yard. As we discussed extensively during the winter the bridge is undergoing major repairs. As far as I know the branch is still on schedule to be reopened by July. Repairs to the second bridge near Hageman are less critical and should be completed by October.

Above is a long distance shot of the work site from the nearby bridge over the South Fork. There were extensive sounds coming from the area and I didn’t want to interrupt any work going on, so I didn’t end up getting too close. Yet even from here you could smell the paint.


Parked in the south end of Lebanon Yard was some light equipment on hand for the repairs. This included an old ex-Union Pacific track speeder with most of the herald still visible on the side. I assume the MOW work on the bridge is being done under contract with the I&O, but that’s just a guess on my part.


I walked over to Main Street and turned down Clay Street to get a better angle of the work that was being done. You can see a bunch of equipment in the gravel lot where the old tool rental place used to be. I’m guessing this is machinery used for the painting. You also can see the bridge fairly clearly through the trees. Most of the structure is covered pretty well for the painting process.

The last thing I noticed was derails set up just south of the Broadway grade crossing and just north of the crossing at West Street. I found it humorous but not surprising derails would be set up on a “closed” line. While there was nothing on the track between Broadway and the end-of-track two blocks south, railroads are nothing if not consistent about their safety rules. It was important for the MOW crew to protect the bridge from even the seemingly inconceivable accident.

It’s good to see progress being made on the Lebanon Branch repairs. For continued updates on the status of this work be sure that you are subscribed to Ohio Valley Railroads.

DL&C Trackcharts

Author: Kyle Montgomery
Category: History Railroads: ,

I know a lot of readers are sick of these track chart posts, but I promised to post the ex-

charts from the Conrail era. This will be the last post of its type for a while. I’ll try to do something different for my next couple posts.

At any rate, the first chart I’ll be posting tonight was referred to by Conrail as the “Clement Running Track”. This was the original narrow gauge alignment as built by the TD&B. It runs east from the wye at Hempstead and connects to the mainline to Xenia.

This chart shows the DL&C’s mainline built into Dayton proper. The major customer on this light was the National Cash Register Co, or NCR for short. NCR and the DL&C worked together to provide relief supplies during the great Dayton flood in 1913. By this point the track through the plant was out of service, and today neither the track nor much of the NCR plant remains.

This chart completes the remnants of the DL&C. The line south of Hempstead was operated as another light density line, but was the cost proved to great over the long term and the line did not survive.

These charts provide a wealth of information for anyone doing serious research on the former system. For the casual reader, however, they might appear a bit on the boring side. If you made it this far in the article your reading is appreciated. For something a little more interesting, try this article on Operation Lifesaver in Northern Ohio.

CL&N Trackcharts

Author: Kyle Montgomery
Category: History Railroads: ,

Once again attempting to prove the old saying “better late than never” I’m back with Part 2 of my series on track charts. Today we’ll be looking at some excerpts from a Conrail track chart circa 1985.

The first scan is a little rough but you can see what is basically the right half of the chart featured last week. Not much has changed on the Lebanon Branch besides its owners in the last 21 years. Note the heading at the top that reads “PC Estate Sub”. After the Penn Central bankruptcy this line was deemed impossible to operate at a profit. Instead the government created the concept of the “Light-Density Line” and it was up to the shippers on the line to pay the cost difference. Also notice that no major maintenance occurred on the line since 1955. It’s been no surprised the branch has struggled to remain open. About the only thing that has changed is a drop in track speed to a maximum of 10 mph.

The rest of the Mason Secondary Track is located in the scan above. By this point the 3 mile segment between Brecon and South Mason was out of service but the chart is ambiguous as to whether the rail was still in place. I’m guessing it was, at least in places. On this chart you can also get a little better idea on what spurs have been built since the 1980′s (a lot of development around Stokes for starters) and what spurs have been abandoned in the intervening years (downtown Mason). Compare this to my interactive map of the ex- to see what the line looks like today.

Now we turn to the Blue Ash Secondary track, located above. The far left starts in McCullough Yard and runs North through Blue Ash, ending in Brencon. The Blue Ash Industrial Park made this line a profitable acquisition for Conrail. Once again this is all 10 mph restricted track.

The last segment of the CL&N that made it into Conrail was the other half of the Blue Ash Secondary, running from McCullough through Idlewild to Avondale. This segment didn’t make it to the I&O acquisition and now much of the original ROW has been destroyed by new development in Norwood.

Later this week I’ll be taking a quick look at the ex- segments that made it into Conrail and their respective charts. If anyone has any other particular lines in the Ohio area they would like to see, drop a line in the comments below.

May 2009 In Review

Author: Kyle Montgomery
Category: Updates
Photo: Could Amtrak one day be running on this rail? It was a possibility as discussed earlier in the month.

The monthly review and recap I try to do is a bit late this month, as things on the blog always get a little out of control near finals time for me. But even with a busy school schedule May was an eventful one for Ohio Valley Railroads. 11 posts were written in nearly all areas the site covers (news, history, and modeling).

The month started with some really negative news, with Norfolk Southern announcing the closure of Buckeye Yard. Now it has been reduced to a storage yard with some local interchange taking place in the former departure yard. After the news I did some research on the yard and wrote a small history article covering the yard’s conception and construction by the ill-fated Penn Central. That started me on a Penn Central streak that culminated with the Wreck of the Penn Central book review.

The month ended with some classic related articles including the first post in what I hope will be an ungoing series, Mail by Rail. I also did a then-and-now feature on Mason-Montgomery Road, which turned out to be one of my favorite articles of the month.

With the weather warming up in the future I want to try and get out and get some outdoor photos for some articles. Tomorrow I’m going to try and get the second part about Lebanon track charts written and start planning the next week of posts. I also will continue to cover the development of the 3C Corridor as I hear about it. If you want to be around for all this, be sure to subscribe to the OVR RSS feed.

The Camera Search Begins

Author: Kyle Montgomery
Category: Photography

This fall I was thinking about taking a photography class here at school. To do this I would need an SLR type camera and naturally I also want to get one that is good for railroad photography. My quest for the perfect railfan camera has begun.

Luckily for me, there isn’t anything that more complicated about taking a photo of a train versus a photo of anything else. In reality I just need a quality camera. My budget isn’t much, so all the fancy professional cameras are not an option. Instead, I’ve been taking a look at some of the entry-level cameras from Nikon and Canon. While other companies sell SLR’s, these are the most popular companies and are known for their diverse camera lines.

After a little searching on the web I decided to start by looking at theNikon D60, the Canon Rebel XS, or the Nikon D40.

Nikon D60

Some people say when buying something you should start at the top, figure out the features you don’t need, and then work your way down. The Nikon D60 (pictured above) is not short on features coming complete with a 10.3 Megapixel sensor. It also shoots up to 3 frames per second features some of the newest Nikon technology. This comes at a price, however, and the D60 is the most expensive of the three cameras I will be looking at today. Amazon has it at $537 dollars complete with kit lens.

While the kit lenses is nice (I won’t be upgrading for some time) it is nice to have other options. Unlike the D40, the higher model D60 works with the majority of currently available Nikon lenses. It also has an “active cleaning system” that is not present on the D40.

Overall the D60 shoots fast and quality photographs. I’ve used one in person, and I have little to complain about it. The colors were noticeably sharper then the point-and-shoot camera I have right now (obviously) and navigating the menus was simple and intuitive. I consider the D60 a high scoring contender in my search for a camera.

Canon Rebel XS

The Canon Rebel XS will be the Canon entry for today. The Rebel is 10.1 Megapixels and features image stabilization in the body. The major differences between Canon and Nikon generally boil down to user preference. Nikon has greater compatibility with the lenses they have issued over the years while Canon generally holds a slight edge in market share. Taking everything into account the performance result is a wash, and it is important to choose the model you like the best, regardless of the manufacturer.

Back to the Rebel. This camera goes for $539 on Amazon which places it around the D60 in terms of value and features. Also, if you want something a little better than the XS be sure to look at the XSi. This camera features a slightly better sensor with slightly more pixels for a slightly higher price.

Nikon D40

The third camera today will be another Nikon. The D40 is the cheapest camera I’m looking at, but that doesn’t necessarily mean its bad. This camera only has 6.1 Megapixels, but as anyone who has done research knows, megapixels aren’t the end all be all of cameras. The important thing is sensor size and the D40 has a similar sensor size to other entry-level models.

The main benefit of the D40 is its price, being only $411 with a quality kit lens on Amazon. The drawback, however, is a lack of image stabilization in the camera body. Only certain lenses with the stabilization built-in work ideally with the D40. This is less of a problem if you are buying all your lenses from scratch and more of a problem if you already have acquired some lenses used, but it is important to keep in mind when planning just how serious your photography hobby will be down the line.

Alas, my search is not over quite yet. I still have a lot to learn about what makes a quality camera, as so much goes into it beyond features on the box. These three cameras just scratch the surface on what is out there. For research I’ve used Digital Photography Review and Steve’s Digicams.

What about you? Do you have a favorite camera to take railfanning? Let your preference be known in the comments below!