Mike's Railroad Crossing Forum

*originally recorded on 5-21-21*

Signal on the left: 2 pairs of Safetran 8 inch lights, a General Signals Type 3 electronic bell, a Safetran gate mechanism, and NEG LED gate lights.
Signal on the right: 2 pairs of Safetran 8 inch lights, a Safetran gate mechanism, and NEG LED gate lights.

After messing-up my shot of this crossing with the northbound grain train, I stuck around here to see if anything else would come through before I'd need to head home. Thankfully, after about an hour and a half of waiting, the signal to my north upgraded to clear, and not too long after that, NS 23N (IIRC) came through with a Dash-9 leading an SD70ACe. Certainly quite nice to get two Dash-9 leaders on the same day, can't recall the last time I saw that happen. This also wound-up being the last train I caught on this day, so it was certainly a nice one to end off on.
After the train passed, an NS crew member (I believe on one of the locals I caught earlier) saw me out at this crossing and gave me an NS-branded sunglasses holder, which was honestly quite nice of him. It'll honestly be quite useful for documenting crossings, so I'm glad to have it. I also left in my recording of the MP 79.5 detector nearby at the end of the video as well, for those who want to listen to it.

This crossing is quite a nice one, featuring what appears to have been an early (or maybe mid) 70s SOU install. All of the equipment that's still here from the original install has Safetran branding (with both gate mechs being of the "mid-70s" design), though, according to street view, this crossing appears to have originally had a RACO mechanical bell! Not entirely sure if it was re-used from a previous install here, or if it was one of the last "RACO" bells to be made (and installed) after Safetran came into existence (as Safetran didn't immediately redesign & rebrand the bells, it appears), but either way, it certainly appears to have been one. Sadly, however, NS replaced it sometime between 2012 and 2015 with a General Signals e-bell, though I don't know if that GS e-bell would've been the same one as the current one or not. If it was, it was probably one of the earliest GS Type 3s to crop-up on an NS-owned crossing, as it can be seen on street view imagery from May of 2015. If it wasn't, which I suspect is the case, the bell here was certainly replaced again sometime much more recently, though I couldn't really tell you when exactly that was. Either way though, this is certainly quite a nice, classic crossing and I'm glad I was able to end off on it.
Also, believe it or not, this is technically on the same road that Park Avenue in Lindale's on, though obviously under a different name due to being in a different city.