Hospital Drive, Madisonville, KY

[freebrickproductions]

*originally recorded on 2-6-26*

Signal on the left: 2 pairs of WCH 12x24 inch lights with Leotek EV Series LEDs, a Siemens gate mechanism, and NEG LED gate lights.
Signal on the right: 2 pairs of WCH 12x24 inch lights with Leotek EV Series LEDs, 1 pair of Federal Signal 12x20 inch lights with WCH 2nd Generation LEDs, an NEG electronic bell, a Siemens gate mechanism, RECO LED gate lights, and an NEG LED gate light.

After catching B795 in Hanson, vtgrxrman and I hopped on back down to this crossing in Madisonville as we knew there was an I026 approaching and I thought it'd be a nice crossing to film. After a while of waiting, around or shortly after sunset, IIRC, we were finally able to catch our third and final train of the day: CSX I026 heading north through Madisonville with a pair of ES44AHs pulling and CSX 1875, the P&LE heritage unit (and a third ES44AH), working as the mid-train DPU! Definitely great ending off this day with another heritage unit, even if I'd caught this one before. Amusingly, the two locomotives up front are only three locomotives apart on CSX's roster, with the leader being CSX 923 and the trailing unit being CSX 926.

This crossing is a pretty decent one, even if it's fairly well modernized. Originally, there was a 1970s L&N double-mast install that was still fairly original here, outside of having a rear light on the far signal replaced with what appears to have been a reused WCH 12x24 inch light sometime between 2008 and 2014. However, sometime between EthantheRailfanner's two visits to this crossing in 2020 and 2021, CSX replaced most of the light heads here and upgraded the crossing to LED at the same time. At the time, the far signal got all reused Safetran 12x24 inch lights with Dialight Ball LEDs while the closer signal had its main lights replaced with newer WCH 12x24 inch lights, with a pair of WCH 2nd Gen LEDs in the front pair and a pair of Leotek EV Series LEDs in the rear pair, while the side lights were thankfully retained and just upgraded with another pair of WCH 2nd Gen LEDs. Finally, for whatever reason, sometime after 2023, CSX would replace the signals here entirely with the current ones.
I will say, the most recent upgrade here was definitely a bit of a strange one. While the far signal appears to just be a standard modern CSX signal, the closer one honestly almost seems to be built out of spare parts! All of the lights on this signal appear to be completely reused, with the side lights being reused from the old signal they replaced. Strangely, while the main lights here were also reused, they weren't reused from the old signal, as they appear to be from the mid-2010s, though with newer LEDs, while the replacement lights on the old signal appear to have been brand new at the time. The bracket for them is also rather strange, as it has the lights being mounted closer together than normal while also being very off-centered from the mast for whatever reason. Certainly gives this signal a rather strange appearance, NGL. The base, bell, and gate mech all seem to be brand new, though strangely the base is a single-sided WCH one mounted in a similar fashion to how the MI base for the gate mast on this side had been mounted, and the mast itself seems to have been potentially reused from somewhere based on its condition. The gate lights on the closer signal also aren't very evenly spaced for whatever reason, though I suspect that's because it seems to be reused from the old signal with the middle gate light having been replaced and relocated slightly.

https://www.rxrsignals.com/Kentucky/L-Q ... /Hospital/