Mike's Railroad Crossing Forum

*originally recorded on 9-30-23*

Signal on the left: 3 pairs of WCH 12x24 inch lights with GE Dotted LEDs and a WCH Type 1.5 electronic bell.
Signal on the right: 2 pairs of WCH 12x24 inch lights with GE Dotted LEDs.

After I caught the Summerville Steam Special at 39th Street, I chased it on down to the CCKY's line in Rossville, GA, to film it at this crossing. However, just a few hundred feet shy of the state line, the train had to come to a stop, causing this crossing to time out.
Apparently, last night, a person had gone to a bar on Rossville Boulevard in Chattanooga just north of the state line. As they'd gotten drunk, they rightfully got driven home by someone they knew. Unfortunately, they'd parked their fouling the tracks when they got there, and the car was left there overnight. Thankfully, the train was able to come to a stop before hitting it with no injuries and no damage to either the train or the SUV. A few photos I took of this are seen at the end of the first video.
After about half an hour of waiting, someone with a key was able to arrive and get the Chevy blocking the tracks moved (and presumably pick-up the parking ticket as well), and the train was able to continue. Here we see the Summerville Steam Special resuming the trip south, now running about 30 minutes behind schedule.

This crossing is a pretty decent one, featuring a pair of older gateless signals at it. Originally, there was a pair of CofG-era signals here, but, in the 1970s (it seems), the lights on the signals were all replaced with Safetran 8 inch lights by the SOU. Then, in the 2000s, the CCKY replaced the bell here with the current WCH e-bell. Then, sometime between 2007 and 2011, the old CofG masts here were replaced with the current ones, which appear to have been reused from somewhere, with all of the lights and the bell being reinstalled onto the current masts. Around this same time, the relay case was replaced with what appears to be a newer, but still reused, SOU one. Finally, sometime in about 2016/2017, the lights here were upgraded to the current LED WCH 12x24s, with thankfully no major changes to the crossing since. As the lights originally installed on these masts were 8 inch, the side lights on the far signal have had the bottoms of their backgrounds trimmed-off so they could be installed.

http://www.rxrsignals.com/Georgia/R-Z/Rossville/Gordon/