Talk:Fort Wayne Line

Article scope

Unless I misunderstand things, the main focus of this article should be the Fort Wayne Line itself, which is the Norfolk Southern-owned line between Pittsburgh and Crestline. The former Fort Wayne Secondary can be covered in Chicago, Fort Wayne and Eastern Railroad. If necessary, the PRR history could be split off to Main Line (Pittsburgh to Chicago) or some such. Mackensen (talk) 17:07, 15 April 2018 (UTC)

Porter Sub to Barr to NS Status

The article says: The final piece, from CSX's Porter Subdivision at Tolleston northwest to NS's Chicago Line, the former LS&MS in far northwestern Gary, Indiana, at Buffington, is owned by CSX with NS trackage rights, junctioning CSX's Barr Subdivision at Clarke Junction (also in northwestern Gary). Unfortunately most of that is abandoned, NS does use part of it coming from the Porter Sub but they quickly switch over to the Wabash old right away to access CN Kirk Yard. There is no diamond at old Clarke Jct, nor can there be a diamond because of raised CN realignment bypassing the Gary Airport. The section between the CSX and NS is abandoned in place. Source: My job as a locomotive engineer. BeckyAnne(talk) 19:54, 6 January 2023 (UTC)

Yes, it seems my original confusion was not recognizing there are two parallel lines, here, and that this article is essentially about the abandoned Pennsylvania Railroad ROW. It looks like from the former crossing northwest a bit over 1,100 ft that the NS "Gary Branch" branches off to follow the old Wabash ROW, which connects with CN and Kirk Yard and such. Ownership from Tolleston to the river is still as it's been for years: CSX to the southwest and NS to the northeast. North of the river, it appears that there was a transfer of ROW from NS to CSX right where the Wabash lined split into a yard. CSX owns the continuation of what would have been the NS Gary Branch, which now veers off a bit to the north and which NS still owns. I guess if they ever put back in a line they'd have to get trackage rights over the NS Gary Branch up to this point, and then this new line could be connected back into CSX's existing Barr Subdivision to the northwest. I'd really like to see a page on the Gary Branch, quite frankly, which is an existing line, if even mostly unused.--Criticalthinker (talk) 04:47, 14 November 2024 (UTC)