Mike's Railroad Crossing Forum

As some of you might have heard, the Ridgely tower in Springfield is set to close in June. This tower was the tower to control an interlocking with Armstrong levers connected to piperods, but recently the piperods were removed, here are some emails a friend of mine who works in the tower has sent me:

4-22-10
It is no secret anymore! Track gang due back May 1. Track work to be done under traffic. Signal cutover June 23rd. Our last day, June 30th.
Then I can really say, "UP Ridgely Tower out........."!

5-4-10
History was made on Sunday May 2, 2010 at Ridgely Tower. Sometime in the AM, Signal #29 was retired from service and removed, as was switch #22 and lock rod #21. The pipe rod that extended from the Tower to the switch severed and all the pipe removed and cut up. When I showed up for work today at 3PM, they were just doing the finishing touches of removing the last of the pipe and some of the cememt blocks that supported the pipe rods. What all this means is, as of AM, May 2, 2010, THERE ARE NOW NO MORE SWITCHES LEFT IN THE COUNTRY THAT ARE CONTROLLED VIA AN ARMSTRONG LEVER, CONECTED TOGETHER VIA A PIPEROD. Ridgely Tower was the last Armstong Lever Tower in the Country to have this and as of May 2, 2010, history has been made. Records indicate that the last train that this switch was lined for was for UP Local Freight, LSF51, on Thursday, April 29, 2010. It should be noted that switch #22 and locked by lock lever #21, in normal position, was lined for move through the siding/passing track. You had to reverse it to allow a move into or out of the south end of Ridgely Yard. So, it didn't get thrown all that much.
Also today, the communication cables were taken out and retired, so the Tower no longer has a phone, computer, printer or fax service. All communication is done stricly via radio! The communication lines had to be removed to allow for room for installation of the new siding switch that will be off the main line immediately North of the Tower. Communications Department has no intentions of putting them back in until the Tower is gone.
We have received our official notice of intent to eliminate to jobs at Ridgely Tower on or after June 7th by UPRR.
The track and signal gangs working on this project are using channel 86 to talk to each other on while performing their work.
As I get more info. on new developments, I will advise.
Thanks to all of you for your support, I feel honored to be a part of history, even though it means the end of my job here.

On the morning of Tuesday, May 11, 2010, UP Signal Department will cutover the new Signal System at Ridgely Tower and give control of it to UP Dispatcher 31 in Omaha. At that point, Operators at Ridgely Tower will no longer control train moves at this location. Operators jobs will be abolished on Monday, June 7th, but the Tower may be closed long before that. I will let you know when I get an actual date on the last Operator to be onduty at the Tower, but I almost bet it will be a situation of the boss comming by (since there is no longer a telephone at the Tower) and saying that no one needs to come to work anymore, and that will be the end of that.
Track gang will be back Saturday May 15th to finish the track shift and remove two switches. They should be done on Monday, May 17th and they will depart the area. Signal Dept. should be done on May 12th with clean up of their part of the area and will move to Barr Jct. to install the radio controlled power switch at that location.

Hate to have to post this... but Ridgely tower is gone forever as of Monday morning. Here is an article on it's demise in our local paper. The attached photograph was on the front page.

http://www.sj-r.com/top-stories/x181935 ... comes-down