[ Website Contents ] [ River Sub Intro ] [ Scenic Highlights ] [ Milepost 0 ] [ North Bergen ] [ Ridgefield Park ] [ Bogota ] [ Teaneck ] [ Bergenfield ] [ Dumont ] [ Haworth-Closter ] [ Harrington Park ] [ Norwood-Northvale ] [ At The Border ] [ Orangeburg ] [ C712 Switching At Aluf Plastics ] [ Blauvelt ] [ West Nyack ] [ Valley Cottage - Congers ] [ Haverstraw-West Haverstraw ] [ Stony Point-Jones Point ] [ Last Tomkins Cove Coal Train ] [ Coal to Tomkins Cove ] [ E473 Sets Out A Hopper ] [ Iona Island ] [ Fort Montgomery ] [ Double-Tracking CP43-45 ] [ Fallen Signals 2007 ] [ Highland Falls-Newburgh ] [ Balmville ] [ Roseton-Highland Landing ] [ Balloons Over The River Line ] [ Walkway Over Hudson ] [ West Park ] [ Esopus-Ulster Park-Port Ewen ] [ Kingston ] [ Lake Katrine - Glenerie ] [ Mount Marion ] [ Saugerties ] [ Malden-Eavesport-West Camp ] [ Cementon - Alsen ] [ The Ditcher ] [ Catskill ] [ Athens ] [ Coxsackie ] [ C711 switching at MP 120 ] [ Hannacroix-New Baltimore ] [ Ravena ] [ CP-SK, Selkirk ] [ Infrequently Asked Questions ]
The CSX River Subdivision
The Ditcher At Work (1 of 3)
Added 9/2011 Copyright © 20011 Lewis Bogaty
Off to photograph the Catskill Trestle on a beautiful June day with blue skies and puffy white clouds above, I was sailing north through Alsen on Route 9W when I saw something that would have made me come to a screeching halt if the road had been wide enough to permit me to stop and turn around. Blocking Embought Road, just north of CP 106, was a bright yellow caboose.
Finally able to turn around a mile or so farther up the road, I hoped I would be able to find this unusual train, whatever it was. But I needn't have worried. When I swung around onto Embought Road, it was still sitting there blocking the crossing. I now saw that the caboose was attached to a very strange-looking work train.
In fact, there was no rush at all. As the train began to move, it soon became clear that it was simply going back and forth, and back and forth again. I watched as the on-board machinery worked, plunging its massive arm into the earth on the side of the track, grinding up dirt with its very serious blade, sending the dirt upward on a conveyer belt, and spewing it out a chute, into a gondola, or launching the dirt directly into the adjacent field.
As I learned from the track foreman supervising the project, the "ditcher" had been at work for two weeks now creating a drainage ditch in order to alleviate track flooding at several spots between Milepost 106 and Milepost 110. When periodically the dispatcher reclaimed the single-track for a passing freight train, the ditcher retreated to the team-track siding at Milepost 110, where it also spent the nights. I would spend two days photographing DC-2, the Loram "ditcher" at work.
The Ditcher In Catskill, June 2008
On The Team-Track Siding At MP 110
Above and Below: DC-2 spent the night on the siding just south of Depot Street in Catskill. The view is looking south.
Above: Looking north at the former Catskill train depot.
Above and Below: DC-2 begins to move off the siding, and waits for a northbound to pass.
Above and Below: DC-2 at the Depot Street crossing.
