Southern versus N&W Railway mail routes

[NW Mailing List]

From: aschneiderjr at sbcglobal.netTo: "Frank Scheer"
<f_scheer at yahoo.com>, RailwayPO at yahoogroups.com 
Date: Wed, 13 Feb 2008 16:26:00 -0600 
Subject: Re: [RailwayPO] Southern versus N&W Railway
mail routes 
    
Did RPO cars run only between their designated end
points (such as Washingon and Bristol in this case)
with mail being transferred to another route (Bristol 
and Chattanooga) and another car, in this case of the
Southern?

In retrospect it seems surprising that the post office
didn't emulate Pullman and own its own cars, built to
its own standards, and simply pay the railroad to haul
them. For routes not meriting a full 60 foot car that
wouldn't have worked, of course, but it would have
reduced the risk to a railroad of having a major mail
route and having to buy cars which would become
useless if the route was removed. And while the
individual railroad might have risk if it bought cars,
the Post Office wouldn't because the mail would still
be moving on some route. In addition, having its own
cars would eliminate having to switch cars at
interchange points like Bristol.

Alex Schneider


February 13, 2008

The situation you've described, Alex, about carriers
left with unneeded capital investment if the Post
Office Department decided to withdraw service is
precisely what confronted the Boston & Maine and
Jersey Central in the mid-1960s.  The Post Office
Department declined to make a long-term commitment to
the carriers for the service life of replacement RPO
cars.  The Union Pacific was the last carrier to order
new equipment and did so in 1963.  Five years later,
all of it was excessed.

Back to Bristol: the cars continued through with the
crew on a southbound train beginning to "lock down
around Rural Retreat.  By Abingdon, the crew started
to re-hang the racks with empty pouches and sacks
according to the Bristol & Chattanooga rack diagram. 
When the WASH & BRIS RPO Train 41 crew climbed off,
the BRIS & CHAT RPO Train 41 crew got on, labeled the
racks and inserted case headers, and started
distribution.  A similar process was repeated
northbound for Train 42, with the lock-down starting
at Johnson City.

A Southern Railway car was always assigned to the WASH
& BRIS RPO.  There was no need to switch in a N&W RPO
at Lynchburg or switch it out at Bristol for the
southbound runs, and vice versa for northbound.

In contrast, the other operating procedure where two
RPO routes met, such as the COLS & NORF RPO East and
West Divisions at Bluefield, was that a car was placed
and the crew worked on "advance time," usually about
two or three hours before arrival of the inbound
train.  Upon arrival, one RPO was switched out and the
other switched in.  The small amount of working mail
that had to be connected between the two routes was
made via platform carts in the 15 or so minutes of
dwell time.  Usually at these junction points, other
equipment in the train consist was being switched in
or out, too, so the station time wasn't entirely the
result of changing RPO cars.

There's a lot more detail that one could get into, but
this covers the two basic operating scenarios for RPO
routes.  If you have other questions, please ask.

Good evening,

Frank Scheer
f_scheer at yahoo.com