The Lehigh & Hudson River was primarily a bridge line providing a link to New England via the New Haven's Hudson River bridge at Poughkeepsie, although there was also a fair amount of local traffic serving online limestone facilities, zinc mines at Franklin & Ogdensburg NJ, and some local customers. L&HR track ran from the New Haven's Maybrook yard in the east to G Tower on the PRR BelDel north of Phillipsburg NJ in the west, with trackage rights on the PRR BelDel to Phillipsburg NJ then over the SE&P bridge to Easton PA with trackage rights from Easton to Allentown PA on the CNJ. In a mileage balancing arrangement, CNJ power operated over the L&HR to Maybrook, compensating for L&HR power operating to Allentown. In the mid to late 1960s the PRR also ran a through freight from Wilmington DE over the BelDel to G Tower & then on to Maybrook over the L&HR. The Reading also ran a unit coal train to United Illuminating in Bridgeport CT over the L&HR.
On my representation of the L&HR the New Haven is represented by staging east of Maybrook, with their Maybrook Yard as the first modeled location. Maybrook will have 12 tracks in total and will be big enough, I think, to require two yard workers: an east yard job to handle New Haven traffic in and out of Maybrook, and a west yard job to handle L&HR and other traffic in and out of Maybrook. Other traffic in and out of Maybrook will include two L&NE through freights in each direction, a PRR through freight in each direction, an Erie through freight in each direction and the unit Reading coal train to and from United Illuminating in Bridgeport CT.
The west Maybrook job will bring staged New Haven trains into Maybrook and will classify the cars by railroad, i.e. L&HR, L&NE, PRR and Erie. The job will not classify cars beyond sorting by railroad. After the mid 1950s, the New Haven no longer classified L&HR cars, but rather simply delivered them to the L&HR, which then took them on to Warwick, the major online L&HR yard, where the L&HR classified them. I plan to follow this scenario, but I'm getting a little ahead in my overview. In terms of the other railroads, since for my purposes their traffic is strictly overhead, there is no need for classification beyond a sort by railroad. The west Maybrook job will also run New Haven trains classified by the east job into staging.
The east Maybrook job will classify trains brought to Maybrook by the L&HR, L&NE, PRR and Erie. The Reading unit coal train is a run through, so won't need classification. At least at the start of operations, I plan to keep the classification simple: all cars are interchanged to the New Haven and destined for their Cedar Hill yard in New Haven CT. Eventually, I might have the east job block cars by destination, such as shorts for Danbury CT, then New Haven cars, then Worcester cars, then Providence cars, then Boston cars. We'll see if that element of complexity needs to be introduced. The east job will consolidate arriving cars into 30 car maximum trains for the New Haven to take east. I envision the various New Haven freights to have specified departure times with specified closing times about an hour before scheduled departure. No last minute shuffling of cars onto a train! Once the closing time passes, that freight is closed & no cars will be added. Gotta give time for the car inspectors to work before the scheduled departure time!
The Maybrook jobs will also be responsible for hostling power & shuffling cabooses. I think they will be pretty busy, but I plan to have enough time between arrivals and departures so that they are not overwhelmed. After all, the goal is to have fun, not work people to death. And, if it turns out that a third person is needed for power hostling and caboose shuffling, I'll add a third person to Maybrook, probably me unless someone else wants the job.
Well, this is getting to be a long post, so I'll end it. The next post will continue the operations discussion west of Maybrook.
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