Speed and trains ticketed

[NW Mailing List]

When I attended Randolph-Macon College in Ashland, VA (many years ago)........If you know Ashland the RF&P mainline between Richmond and Washington goes right through the center of town.  In fact the town was built with the main street (Center Street) being one way on each side of the tracks (double track).  The railroad and street run like this for well over a mile. All the store fronts face the railroad from each side of the tracks. Obviously I spent a fair amount of time watching and photographing the railroad.  If I remember correctly the speed limit through town on the railroad was 25 or 35 mph (maybe the difference was freight vs. passenger trains).  While I never saw it actually happen I was told by numerous people that the Ashland police would run down trains with lights flashing and write speeding tickets to the engineer if they were exceeding the speed limit.  I can recall Police cars setting up as if to create a speed traps for trains but never saw them run one down.  Trains seemed very conscious to the need to adhere speed limit. 

Ed Painter - Narrows, VA  currently living in Russellville, AR

-----Original Message-----
From: nw-mailing-list-bounces at nwhs.org [mailto:nw-mailing-list-bounces at nwhs.org] On Behalf Of NW Mailing List
Sent: Thursday, February 24, 2011 7:17 AM
To: nw-mailing-list at nwhs.org
Subject: Speed and trains ticketed

I doubt this was the FIRST time an engine/engineer were ticketed for
excessive speed by the local g'd'armmes.

I have read of Southern Railway being cited around 1900 for excessive
speed and the engineer and train were held pending some sort of
disposition. That date is NO error for I have read it in local
newspapers and suspect this was not the first. I can't vouch for the
N&W and other RR's, but suspect that if some local cop had an issue
for whatever the reason, it was acted out even at this early date and
the railroad and train and engineer appropriately cited.

Bob Cohen

>

I had a somewhat similar radar speed check experience during the
82-day clerks' strike against the N&W in 1978. During the strike I was
assigned as engineer between Bellevue, OH and Buffalo, NY, a 248-mile
run on the old Nickel Plate main line, and I eventually logged almost
11,000 miles at the throttle during that time.  The double-track line
through Lakewood, OH, west of Cleveland encountered 21 residential
street grade crossings in just two miles! The track speed through here
was 35 mph, and several times my "picture" was taken by the local
police with hand-held radar guns. Luckily, I was right on the money in
terms of speed each time.

>

> Gordon Hamilton

>   ----- Original Message -----

>   From: NW Mailing List

>   To: nw-mailing-list at nwhs.org

>   Sent: Friday, February 18, 2011 1:47 PM

>   Subject: Pokey engineers

>

 Story told to me about my friend G.S. Flower, pokey engineer, late 40
to early 80's; In the early 50's the Sheriff dept. and Virginia
Highway patrol had adapted a new traffic tool, the radar speed check
system. Flower, who was a nuisance to the Tazewell Sheriff, had a
repetition for a heavy throttle hand and was clocked going through
North Tazewell Depot , freight in tow, at 45 MPH. I assume that the
first ever speeding ticket for a Rail Road Engineer was sent to the
Bluefield division office.

>

>   Gene A.

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