Mike's Railroad Crossing Forum

*originally recorded on 2-12-22*

Signal on the left: 1 pair of WRRS 8 inch lights, 1 pair of RACO 8 inch lights, an NEG electronic bell, a Safetran gate mechanism, and RECO LED gate lights.
Signal on the right: 1 pair of WRRS 8 inch lights, 1 pair of RACO 8 inch lights, a Safetran mechanical bell, a Safetran gate mechanism, RECO LED gate lights, and a RECO gate light.

After the grain train came through, I saw CSX had a northbound lined onto the Lineville Sub, so I went over to this crossing to get it. After a little bit of waiting, this northbound intermodal train came through with a fresh-looking CM44AC leading an ET44AH! You can also hear the defect detector located next to this crossing read-out after the train passes.

This crossing is a very nice one, and is probably my favorite one on the Lineville Sub, along with being my favorite one in LaGrange. The signals here are a classic pair of SCL signals from the early 70s, and are a pretty rare style of SCL install. I'm not entirely sure what would make them do a double-mast install like this, but I suspect it was done when the signals were installed to replace a double-mast install from a previous railroad. All of the remaining installs of this style that I'm aware of are located within the state of Georgia, and this is the only one that I'm aware of that still retains the original 8 inch lights. I'd actually recorded one of these down on the Dothan Sub back in 2019, but it had sadly been upgraded to LED.
Thankfully, this guy still manages to be almost entirely original. In fact, up until at least 2013, it was, but sadly, the original Safetran mechanical bell on the far signal died and was replaced with the current NEG e-bell sometime between 2013 and 2016. Since then, no major changes have occurred to these signals, thankfully, and hopefully none will occur for years to come. The remaining Safetran mechanical bell still sounds very nice as well.
As you can see, however, some TLC is needed for this crossing, as the closer signal is missing a background on the left-rear light. One of the visors on the far signal's rear lights is also noticeably damaged.
Another nice little thing about this crossing is the older RECO incandescent gate light on the closer signal. Always nice to see these on CSX lines, but one interesting thing is that this one also appears to have been re-used from elsewhere! Looking at older street view imagery, it appears that the closer signal had a set of Progress Rail(?) gate lights back in 2013, which have obviously long since been replaced. No idea why they chose to reuse an incandescent gate light here, but it's certainly nice to see, either way. Hopefully these classic signals are able to stick around for a while longer.

*originally recorded on 8-10-25*

Signal on the left: 1 pair of WRRS 8 inch lights, 1 pair of RACO 8 inch lights, an NEG electronic bell, a Safetran gate mechanism, NEG LED gate lights, and a RECO LED gate light.
Signal on the right: 1 pair of WRRS 8 inch lights, 1 pair of RACO 8 inch lights, a dead Safetran mechanical bell, a Safetran gate mechanism, an NEG LED gate light, a RECO LED gate light, and a RECO gate light.

After catching the ethanol train, we hopped on over to this crossing to see about rerecording it. After a little bit of waiting, I was able to catch my seventh train of the day: a northbound CSX mixed freight with an ES44AH leading CSX 500, the Spirit of Grafton (an AC44CW) on the head-end and another ES44AH working as the mid-train DPU! Definitely nice to finally catch another CSX Spirit unit, even if it was just trailing.

Since I was last here, the only major upgrades to this crossing were that about half of the gate lights here were replaced with NEG LEDs, though, thankfully, the older RECO incandescent gate light on the closer signal still remains. CSX also replaced the missing background on the left-rear light of the closer signal, along with the damaged visor on the left-rear light of the far signal, with I suspect both parts coming from the old southbound signal at the Park Avenue crossing. Thankfully, nothing else too major has changed to this classic early-70s SCL double mast install, which is great to see. Unfortunately, the remaining 1st Gen Safetran mechanical bell here has died since my last video of this crossing, which is very much a shame as it was still sounding rather healthy back in 2022. I suppose at least the classic 8 inch lights remain here, along with the rare early-70s Safetran gate mechs, though the closer one does sound rather creaky as it operates. Guess it's just starting to show its age as well...

https://www.rxrsignals.com/Georgia/G-Q/LaGrange/Vernon/