Charles Street, Lake City, SC

[freebrickproductions]

*originally recorded on 2-24-22*

Signal on the left: 4 pairs of WCH 8 inch lights, an NEG electronic bell, a WCH gate mechanism, and NEG LED gate lights.
Signal on the right: 2 pairs of WCH 8 inch lights, 2 pairs of WABCO 8 inch lights, an NEG electronic bell, a WCH gate mechanism, and NEG LED gate lights.

After almost missing the local freight, I decided to stick around here and wait for the next train to come. About an hour and a half after the local freight came through, and shortly before sunset, this southbound mixed freight (with a cut of intermodal in the middle of it) came roaring through with an ST70AH on the head-end and an ES44AH as the mid-train DPU! Certainly a rather great train to end the day off on. After this, I returned back to my hotel room in Manning.

This crossing is another nice one, featuring the fourth late-70s SCL WCH install I'd recorded on this day. It appears that in the early 1980s, the SCL replaced the side lights on the closer signal with the current WABCO 8 inch lights. The crossing then remained unchanged for a few decades, but, between 2014 and 2019, CSX replaced the original WCH mechanical bell on the far signal with the current NEG e-bell. Then, sometime between 2019 and 2021, the remaining original WCH mechanical bell on the closer signal was also replaced with an NEG e-bell. Thankfully, the crossing is still fully 8 inch and retains both of the original WCH gate mechs, which it will hopefully keep for many more years to come.