8 THE CALL BOARD

NEWSLETTER

OF THE MOHAWK & HUDSON CHAPTER, N.R.H.S.

August 1993

THE CASTLETON CUT-OFF

Part I:

Selkirk Yard
comprised of three parts: 1) Construction of Selkirk Yard, which was touted by the New York Central to be the most modern and efficiently planned freight car terminal yard in the world. Selkirk Yard, whose west end was to be the western terminus of the Hudson River Connecting Railroad, was to be located between Feura Bush and Selkirk. 2) Construction of a new high-level steel bridge spanning the Hudson River east of Selkirk Yard with a clearance of 135 ft. for navigation. The bridge, located south of the village of Castleton, came to be named the "Alfred H. Smith Memorial Bridge" in memory of the President of the New York Central who met an untimely death a few months before the bridge opened in November of 1924. Smith conceived the project, and it was during his tenure as President of the New York Central that the project was brought to fruition. 3) Construction of several miles of new railroad to connect Selkirk Yard and the bridge with the Boston & Albany at Niverville and the New York Central at Stuyvesant, both on the east side of the Hudson River. It is the Selkirk Yard portion of the "Castleton Cut-Off' project which is the subject of the present article. Selkirk Yard was constructed on an area of flat land six miles long by one mile wide, thereby minimizing grading problems. The yard was graded for a capacity of 11,000 cars, although track for a smaller capacity was actually laid, and the site was estimated to have a potential capacity of 20,000 cars on 250 miles of track. Construction of

By Tim Truscott & Dick Barrett

With the tremendous growth in traffic on the New York Central in the first 'decade of the twentieth century, it became evident that Albany was becoming a bottleneck for traffic between New York City, New England and the West. When the route through West Albany was originally constructed, the railroad was not faced with the traffic demands which were later experienced, nor did it have the engineering and financial resources which were available after the turn of the century. Therefore, the "Albany bottleneck" was, in a sense, a heritage from the early days of railroading when the requirements of the twentieth century could not be foreseen. The bottleneck seemed to have two principle causes: Albany, and hence the West Albany Hill, was at the junction of the Mohawk and Hudson divisions of the New York Central, as well as the Springfield Division of the Boston & Albany; hence, all traffic converged at Albany and it was like trying to squeeze a 26-inch waist into an 18-inch corset to get all the traffic through. Second, the grade at West Albany meant that Boston & Albany trains had to overcome a rise and fall of 130 ft., while westbound Hudson Division freights had to be split into two, three or four sections in order to negotiate the hill; the pusher locomotives required on the West Albany grade placed a substantial demand on the railroad's motive power resources. The sheer volume of traffic at the Albany division junction was substantial. By the time the bottleneck problem was solved, the B&A averaged 2,000 cars daily in and

out of Albany; the Hudson Division of the Central averaged 1,200 cars and the River Division of the West Shore averaged 1,200 cars, for a total of 4,400 cars coming from or going to the east and south. The volume of traffic at Albany to and from the west averaged nearly 4,400 cars per day. Therefore, the total movement of cars through the Albany gateway was about 8,800 cars each day. To ameliorate the problem of the bottleneck, the Central began planning a major engineering project which drew strong resistance from Albany politicians. Part of the solution was to relocate part of this junction, and therefore some of the traffic, out of Albany. The second part of the solution was to find a location where grades would not be a problem. Both parts ofthe solution to the bottleneck problem seemed to lie at Selkirk, just a few miles south of Albany. Naturally, Albany politicians wanted to keep jobs in Albany, and they found ways to thwart the project for about ten years. In 1913 the New York Central organized a subsidiary company, the Hudson River Connecting Railroad Corporation, which was the enti ty under which the project was carried out and owned. The project, known as the "Castleton Cut-Off," was valued at $25,000,000 and was regarded by the New York Central as a substantial railroad engineering achievement as well as a major contribution to public transportation. The Central predicted the project would have an important effect in speeding up the vast percentage of the nation's business which flowed through the Albany gateway. The "Castleton Cut-Off Project" was

August 1993

NEWSLETTER

OF THE MOHAWK & HUDSON CHAPTER, N.R.H.S. make Selkirk the largest east-west freight yard on the New York Central system. One of the innovations of the new yard was to be a computer operated freight car classification system to handle the 2,300 cars per day which passed through Selkirk in 1966; Selkirk was reported to be the first application of this new technology. New York Central C.E.O. AlfredE. Perlman was on hand with a trainload of railroad officials, stockho lders and securities analysts for the symbolic laying of the first rail for what was to become the Alfred E. Perlman Yard. When Perlman Yard opened in 1968,

THE CALL BOARD 9

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the yard was reported to require 22,000 tons of steel and 430 switches. Selkirk Yard was actually two yards, side-by-side: a unit for eastbound traffic and a unit for westbound traffic. Each unit had its own hump for gravity switching of cars, and the switches were electrically operated from towers. The eastbound unit was situated on the south side of the yard, while the westbound unit was on the north side. Each unit included receiving tracks where incoming trains are delivered. After going over their respective humps, the cars moved onto classification trackage. Finally, the cars reached advance tracks, where they were made into outgoing trains. The yard was equipped for night illumination with "flood lighting," apparently an innovation at the time. The floodlights were mounted on tall towers. Electricity for illumination and other uses was purchased from the local utility. An elaborate telephone system was also installed in the yard, with a one-story brick telephone exchange building located near the middle of the yard. Also located near the middle of the yard was a two-story wooden yard-master' s office. Other smaller buildings for supervision, car recording and dispatching were strategically located throughout the yard. The Selkirk engine terminal, located at the easterly end of the yard, included two round houses with stlls 120 feet long. One of the roundhouses was builtto accomodate 32 locomotives, while the other held 30. While the two roundhouses were physically connected, each had its own electrically-powered turntable, and each had its own hot air ventilation fan system. The engine terminal also included seven ash pits and a modem concrete coal storage chute consisting two 600-ton bins served by conveyers. Adjacent to the roundhouses was a building for the administration of the mechanical department, a machine shop, storehouse and oil storage house. In addition, a nearby power house contained three 400-horsepower boilers, electrical transformers, air comprressors and water pumps for fire protection. Selkirk Yard had its own water supply system, with a 16-inch main connecting a large pumphouse, located south of the Castleton bridge on the Hudson River, with SOO,OOO-gallonstorage tanks located at each end of the yard. A railroad Y.M.C.A. was constructed near the east end of the facility. In 1966, as the Penn Central merger was approaching, the New York Central undertook a reconstruction of Selkirk Yard. The project, estimated at $19.7 million, was to

there were reported to be 133 miles of rail with over 400 switches on 632 acres. Instead of two complete yards, an eastbound and a westbound with a hump in each one, the new yard consolidated some functions for both east- and west-bound traffic, and included a single hump for both. Capacity of the new yard was said to be 8,329 cars per day. By the time a new $4 million diesel service facility was opened a year later, $29 million was reported to have been spent on the project. At that time, Selkirk was reported to employ 800 workers.

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The "Castleton Cut-Off," a huge construction project undertaken by the New York Central to alleviate the bottleneck In Albany, was under the corporate name of the Hudson River Connecting Railroad and Included Selkirk Yard, the Alfred H. Smith Memorial Bridge and the connecting trackage to the Boston & Albany Railroad at Niverville, Selkirk Yard and the West Shore Railroad and the New York Central mainline at Stuyvesant. (New York Central Lines Magazine)