Hoyle Avenue, Bay Minette, AL

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freebrickproductions
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Hoyle Avenue, Bay Minette, AL

Post by freebrickproductions » Tue Aug 02, 2022 5:16 pm



*originally recorded on 5-20-22*

Signal on the left: 4 pairs of Safetran 12x24 inch lights, a Siemens gate mechanism, and NEG LED gate lights.
Signal on the right: 2 pairs of WCH 12x24 inch lights with Leotek EV Series LEDs, 4 pairs of WCH 12x24 inch lights, 1 pair of Safetran 12x24 inch lights, a WCH mechanical bell, a Safetran gate mechanism, and RECO LED gate lights.

On May 20th, I got up to try for the AGR once more, but gave up after a bit as I wasn't sure if they'd already gone through the crossing I wanted to record or not (but probably had). As such, I went over and started working on finishing documenting the CSX M&M Subdivision. I'd seen that CSX had a northbound lined out of Mobile when I was documenting the crossings in Bay Minette, so I set-up here and waited when I got to this crossing. After about an hour of waiting, this short northbound mixed freight came through with a pair of ES40DCs for power.

This crossing is a fairly nice one, especially since it's the last crossing on the M&M Sub with a mechanical bell. The signals here appear to have originally been installed in the mid-90s by CSX, but in the 2000s, the gate mechanism on the closer signal was replaced with the current Safetran one. The crossing then remained unchanged until sometime between 2016 and 2021, when a couple of upgrades here occurred. It appears that closer to 2016, the far signal had its gate mech replaced as well, with the current Siemens gate mech. Then, I believe sometime after, CSX upgraded the front and side mast lights on the cantilever here with Leotek EV Series LEDs, but left everything else incandescent. Not sure why they did just those two pairs of lights, TBH. Thankfully, since then, no other major changes seem to have occurred to these signals.
I'm especially glad to see that the WCH mechanical bell is still here, because, as mentioned above, this crossing is the last one along the M&M Sub to retain a mechanical bell. There used to be a trio in Atmore, but all of those sadly got replaced sometime within the past year, despite seeming to still be healthy. Thankfully, this one still sounds fairly healthy as well, so hopefully it'll remain around for many more years to come, though that ain't a guarantee it will.
Also slightly unusually, for 90s CSX install at least, this crossing features a pair of overhead side lights on the cantilever. Don't think I'd ever seen a Premier Products cantilever with overhead side lights before at all, TBH.
All in all though, this is a pretty nice little crossing, and I'm glad I was able to record it.
They/Them for me, please.

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