Mike's Railroad Crossing Forum

*originally recorded on 8-1-24*

Signal on the left: 1 pair of Safetran 8 inch lights, 1 pair of Federal Signal 12x20 inch lights with Leotek EV Series LEDs, 1 pair of WABCO 8 inch lights, 1 pair of Federal Signal 12x20 inch lights, a General Signals Type 2 electronic bell, a WABCO Model 75 gate mech, and NEG LED gate lights.
Signal on the right: 1 pair of WRRS 8 inch lights, 1 pair of Harmon 8 inch lights, 2 pairs of Federal Signal 12x20 inch lights, an NEG electronic bell, a WABCO Model 75 gate mechanism, and an NEG LED gate light.

After filming L617 in Youngsville, I chased them on north to this crossing in downtown Franklinton for my fourth crossing of the day. Thankfully, I beat the train here with a few minutes to spare, so here we get to see CSX L617 once again, continuing north towards Henderson.

This crossing is a pretty nice one, and is one of the last eight crossings on the CSX Norlina Subdivision with 8 inch lights at it. This crossing is also the closest I've come to filming a fully incandescent CSX crossing in NC (which are a real unicorn in the state), and it certainly looks like one from this angle! A video TonyM.8542 recorded here back in 2021 shows the one lone pair of LEDs on the far side of the crossing, for those who want to see them. This crossing is another one that still has evidence of how much more important this part of the S Line used to be as well, as it appears the signals here are still set for the speeds the Silver Star used to run through here, given how early they activate. It appears there also was once three tracks at this crossing, given just how far back the signals are from the one remaining pair of rails.
Either way, these signals appear to be an early to mid-1970s SCL install that's still fairly original. It appears that, later-on in the 1970s, the far signal had its front mast lights replaced with the current Safetran 8 inch lights. Then, in the late-90s, the bell on the closer signal was replaced by a GS Type 1 e-bell.After that, in the 2000s, the signal on the far side had its bell replaced by the current GS Type 2 e-bell. The crossing was left largely unchanged after that, but, sometime between about 2015 and 2019, CSX upgraded the front pair of overhead lights on the far signal to LED, and only that pair of lights for some reason. Thankfully, the crossing has remained largely unchanged since then, but, sadly, sometime after street view last went through this crossing in August of 2023, CSX replaced the GS Type 1 e-bell on the closer signal with the current NEG e-bell.
Thankfully, despite that, the vast majority of the lights here still remain incandescent, which is great to see. Also nice to be able to record some more incandescent FS 12x20s here, since it seems like those are starting to get hard to find here in the southeastern US. The 8 inch mast lights here are great to see as well, so I'm glad to get some more filmed. This crossing is also the third SCL WABCO install, all from about this same time, that I've seen with these unusual 4 inch gated masts at it. I suspect these signals must've been made early on into the production of the WABCO Model 75, as I believe the AL-70 gate mechs were typically mounted on signals with 4 inch masts. Definitely still a bit unusual to see, either way.