McIntosh Street #1, Vidalia, GA

[freebrickproductions]

*originally recorded on 7-1-20*

Signal on the left: 2.5 pairs of Safetran 12x24 inch lights, 1 WCH 12x20 inch light, a Safetran gate mechanism, and RECO LED gate lights.
Signal on the right: 4 pairs of Safetran 12x24 inch lights, a WCH mechanical bell, a Safetran gate mechanism, and RECO LED gate lights.

After L782 tied down, we went up towards Macon thinking they'd be running an L781 down to Vidalia on this particular evening, though it turned out they were going to run the train up from Vidalia to Macon, so we went back down to Vidalia and waited on the crew. After the crew got here, I had a fun time chatting with the engineer (who's quite friendly!) while he waited on a track warrant in order to head west. Once he did though, Ethan and I got on over to this crossing and set-up, as it had a decent amount of ambient light around it.

This crossing is another nice one, featuring what I believe are a pair of SBD Safetran signals installed back in the 1980s, with the crossing having all Safetran equipment and the far signal featuring 4 pairs of lights (instead of the three it has now). It wasn't too long before changes started happening to this crossing though, as in the 1990s, the GC replaced the gate mech on the closer signal with a newer Safetran one. Then, in 2008, the far signal was clipped and two of the lights were broken off, one side light and one main light. It appears that as a result, the GC decided to take the surviving sidelight and re-use it as the replacement front light.
Then, sometime between 2008 and 2014, the original Safetran mechanical bell here was replaced with the current WCH mechanical bell. Then, sometime between 2016 and 2018, the same main light that had broken off before, which had been getting struck a few times over the past 10 years, was struck and broken off, being replaced with the current WCH 12x20. Since then, no major changes appear to have occurred at this crossing.
All in all, this is a pretty nice set-up, so I'm glad to have recorded it.