Mike's Railroad Crossing Forum

A few days ago, TrainmanKight found this website that is similar to that of the Ohio PUC crossings site, located here: http://gradecrossings.puco.ohio.gov/advanced.php

Well, he found another site very similar to that here, for the Illinois crossings! There are a lot of archived pictures of crossings, some back in the early 2000s, including older "pre-upgrades" and abandonments that can be seen here.

http://www.icc.illinois.gov/railroad/advanced.aspx

I'm sure a lot of Illinois people are going to spend a LOT of time here.

Thats incredable! i might spend all day on that!

http://www.icc.illinois.gov/railroad/cr ... &city=1490

I remember that crossing with the wigwag! it was removed around 1999. One of my oldest memories of a train was at that crossing.

There were alot of Griswold Crossing signals with gates in Iliinois that have been removed. I remember them on the Milwaukee Road and the C&NW in the 70's and the 80's.Great site.

Smjh1979 wrote:A few days ago, TrainmanKight found this website that is similar to that of the Ohio PUC crossings site, located here: http://gradecrossings.puco.ohio.gov/advanced.php

Well, he found another site very similar to that here, for the Illinois crossings! There are a lot of archived pictures of crossings, some back in the early 2000s, including older "pre-upgrades" and abandonments that can be seen here.

http://www.icc.illinois.gov/railroad/advanced.aspx

I'm sure a lot of Illinois people are going to spend a LOT of time here.

yah well its helped me not feel like a retard because i remember soo many A Gates and teardrops in the east st louis/st Clair county area
and i was not dreaming i found all of those xings

Here's a couple interesting ones from East St. Louis or at least were:
http://www.icc.illinois.gov/railroad/cr ... y=C163&s=O

http://www.icc.illinois.gov/railroad/cr ... y=C163&s=O

This inventory needed to be done sooner, as it's still missing a lot of the good crossings that were removed from the old CSX line through Belleville and on the lines through Glen Carbon and Edwardsvile.

CIC755 wrote:Here's a couple interesting ones from East St. Louis or at least were:
http://www.icc.illinois.gov/railroad/cr ... y=C163&s=O

http://www.icc.illinois.gov/railroad/cr ... y=C163&s=O

This inventory needed to be done sooner, as it's still missing a lot of the good crossings that were removed from the old CSX line through Belleville and on the lines through Glen Carbon and Edwardsvile.

Interesting!

Anyone notice the rusty old crossbuck on the Griswold signal on that first link? You can see it plainly in the lower pictures (the daylight ones), but it appears to have been replaced in the upper (dark) pictures.

Also, of course the signals in the 2nd link were completely upgraded. Too bad! All those old Griswolds needed was some mast lights added.

Check this out!
I was really hoping this would be out there still. This was a failed attempt at a barrier gate that would supposidly be able to keep a full size truck from entering the crossing. The system failed miserably and the barrier gates would get stuck down for days at a time thus rendering the crossing unpassable. This crossing now has 4 quad gates.

Here is the link on the ICC page to that crossing. It shows both new and old pictures:

http://www.icc.illinois.gov/railroad/cr ... s=O&aar=UP

I also found another crossing down the road that also had these barrier gates installed at one time (oddly along with regular crossing gates as well). Here it is:

http://www.icc.illinois.gov/railroad/cr ... s=O&aar=UP

If memory serves, those were arrester nets (or something like that) - like are on aircraft carriers - that lowered when a train came. They were supposedly being tested on the proposed high speed line. Didn't work well, and I think some of them had the net drop with no train around.

There should be old photos of another one of those setups somewhere around Alton or Hartford.

At least the upgrades to 4-quad weren't all bad. At least they used clear LEDs.

CIC755 wrote:If memory serves, those were arrester nets (or something like that) - like are on aircraft carriers - that lowered when a train came. They were supposedly being tested on the proposed high speed line. Didn't work well, and I think some of them had the net drop with no train around.

There should be old photos of another one of those setups somewhere around Alton or Hartford.

their was a special on dateline a while back on those nets damn basket ball game interrupted half the show tho, but yah those nets were interesting but a fail.
If you cant stop for a four quad gate go right ahead and say hello to the real enforcer Amtrak seriously thou im glad all these xings are getting replaced someone gets hit at least once a week along that line