18th Street #4, Birmingham, AL

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18th Street #4, Birmingham, AL

Post by freebrickproductions » Sun Feb 05, 2023 11:59 am



*originally recorded on 2-4-23*

Signal on the left: 1.5 pairs of WCH 12x24 inch lights with Leotek EV Series LEDs, 1 WCH 12x24 inch light with a WCH 2nd Generation LED, an NEG electronic bell, 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, an NEG electronic bell, an Invensys Rail gate mechanism, and RECO LED gate lights.

On February 4th, I went down to Birmingham to pick-up a fandom friend of mine at the airport, as they'd been stuck there for around 14 hours waiting for her partner (who was dealing with familial issues, from what I understand). While waiting for said partner to get in touch, we hung-out in Birmingham for a bit, visiting the Sloss Furnaces. As we were leaving, an NS local freight came through 32nd Street heading back to the yard on the Ensley Branch, so I went over to 18th Street #3 to see if I could record it again. As it was approaching, I saw this coal train nearby on the CSX Mineral Subdivision begin to move, so I quickly ran up to this crossing and was able to record it passing through. First time getting one of these coal trains on the Mineral Subdivision, had seen the occasional one before but was never able to catch 'em. This train just had a pair of ES44AHs for power though, and was the only train that I caught on this day.
The NS local freight can also be heard going through the 18th Street #3 crossing behind me, that just had a long-hood forwards SD60e for power.

This crossing is a decent one, though a bit on the boring side, IMHO, especially compared to some of the other crossings on the Mineral Sub. The signals here were originally installed by CSX back in 2013, replacing a pair of crossbucks. However, in 2022, the only major change occurred to this crossing, when the far signal was replaced almost entirely with the current one, though one of the lights from the previous signal appears to have been re-used onto the new one, for some reason. Since then, however, no further changes have occurred here, and the closer one is still pretty much almost entirely original.
Not entirely sure why the far signal was replaced, and although it'd been leaning heavily when I first documented this crossing back in 2020 or so, it'd been straightened-out by CSX since then. I'm guessing it must've been hit by a car last year or something.
Honestly, had I known this coal train was there and about to leave, I might've gone for one of the other, more interesting, crossings between 16th Street and Boyles Yard, but I'm still glad I was able to get this guy recorded. The closer signal here's aged fairly nicely, IMHO.

http://www.rxrsignals.com/Alabama/A-F/Birmingham/18_4/
They/Them for me, please.

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