B100 By Marble Hall
Berkshire and Eastern Railroad train B100 is rounding the curve approaching the junction with the Conn River Line at CPF385on B&E's former Pan Am Railways Freight Mainline, the one time Boston and Maine Fitchburg Division. Berkshire and Eastern is a Genesee and Wyoming owned company that was newly created to act as the neutral third party operator of the former Pan Am Southern property as a condition of the sale of Pan Am to CSX.
Train B100 is the symbol B&E uses for the continuation to Ayer of Norfolk Southern eastbound 264 (intermodal 63rd Street Yard in Chicago to Mechanicville) that used to be known as 22K. The train is led by the standard SD60E which is necessary due to it being one of a small fleet of this model equipped with ACSES for operation on the MBTA property east of Westminster. This train is on borrowed time here because another condition of the sale was NS being granted trackage rights for one pair of premium trains (this one and its westbound counterpart) over CSXT's former Boston and Albany route. These trains will then take the old Delaware and Hudson Albany main to Voorheesville, NY and utilize the connection on to Selkirk Branch which has been rebuilt there. From there they will travel east via Selkirk Yard, the Castelton Bridge and the Berkshire and Boston Subs to Worcester and on up to Ayer. Allegedly that routing will commence within the next year of less, so if you want shots of 'the pig train' on the old Boston and Maine the time is now!
From 1927 until 1969 Greenfield was headquarters for the Fitchburg Division, one of four divisions (along with the New Hampshire, the Portland, and the Terminal Divisions) on the over 2000 mile long system. And this colorful stucco building at the foot of Miles Street once served as division headquarters for the mighty Fitchburg.
Back in its railroad day it was known colloquially as 'Marble Hall' presumably as a slight to the seemingly autocratic management who ruled from behind their big mahogany desks in smoke filled rooms at the end of long marble hallways. While that grand description may be apt for the corridors of power in New York or Philadelphia on the great eastern trunk lines, it was more wry humor for a frugal New England pike.
Here the Superintendent, Division Engineer and Dispatchers ruled over the heart of the old Boston & Maine controlling two vital mainline routes, the east-west Fitchburg main from Ayer to Mechanicville and on to Rotterdam and the north-south Conn River main stem from Springfield to White River Jct. and all their attendant branch lines.
While the passenger station has been gone for nearly a half century this structure, long since repurposed, remains in its same position continuing to observe the daily passage of a half dozen Berkshire and Eastern Railroad freights on the modern Fitchburg.
Greenfield, Massachusetts
Friday April 26, 2024
B100 By Marble Hall
Berkshire and Eastern Railroad train B100 is rounding the curve approaching the junction with the Conn River Line at CPF385on B&E's former Pan Am Railways Freight Mainline, the one time Boston and Maine Fitchburg Division. Berkshire and Eastern is a Genesee and Wyoming owned company that was newly created to act as the neutral third party operator of the former Pan Am Southern property as a condition of the sale of Pan Am to CSX.
Train B100 is the symbol B&E uses for the continuation to Ayer of Norfolk Southern eastbound 264 (intermodal 63rd Street Yard in Chicago to Mechanicville) that used to be known as 22K. The train is led by the standard SD60E which is necessary due to it being one of a small fleet of this model equipped with ACSES for operation on the MBTA property east of Westminster. This train is on borrowed time here because another condition of the sale was NS being granted trackage rights for one pair of premium trains (this one and its westbound counterpart) over CSXT's former Boston and Albany route. These trains will then take the old Delaware and Hudson Albany main to Voorheesville, NY and utilize the connection on to Selkirk Branch which has been rebuilt there. From there they will travel east via Selkirk Yard, the Castelton Bridge and the Berkshire and Boston Subs to Worcester and on up to Ayer. Allegedly that routing will commence within the next year of less, so if you want shots of 'the pig train' on the old Boston and Maine the time is now!
From 1927 until 1969 Greenfield was headquarters for the Fitchburg Division, one of four divisions (along with the New Hampshire, the Portland, and the Terminal Divisions) on the over 2000 mile long system. And this colorful stucco building at the foot of Miles Street once served as division headquarters for the mighty Fitchburg.
Back in its railroad day it was known colloquially as 'Marble Hall' presumably as a slight to the seemingly autocratic management who ruled from behind their big mahogany desks in smoke filled rooms at the end of long marble hallways. While that grand description may be apt for the corridors of power in New York or Philadelphia on the great eastern trunk lines, it was more wry humor for a frugal New England pike.
Here the Superintendent, Division Engineer and Dispatchers ruled over the heart of the old Boston & Maine controlling two vital mainline routes, the east-west Fitchburg main from Ayer to Mechanicville and on to Rotterdam and the north-south Conn River main stem from Springfield to White River Jct. and all their attendant branch lines.
While the passenger station has been gone for nearly a half century this structure, long since repurposed, remains in its same position continuing to observe the daily passage of a half dozen Berkshire and Eastern Railroad freights on the modern Fitchburg.
Greenfield, Massachusetts
Friday April 26, 2024