Shenandoah Valley line

[NW Mailing List]

Well said Mason,
 
As a lifelong fan of the Shenandoah Division, it shall always be the  
Shenandoah Division. My grandmother's house was along the grade at Nace and I  
built my house within sight of the trestle at Nace in 1985.
 
Thanks for the explanation of how this misconception got started.
 
Thanks,
 
Richard D. Shell
Troutville, VA
 
 
In a message dated 4/25/2010 8:36:55 A.M. Eastern Daylight Time,  
nw-mailing-list at nwhs.org writes:

Bob and  the NW Mailing List,

The Shenandoah Line was never called  the "H" line. It was always called
either the Hagerstown District, north of  Shenandoah VA, or the Roanoke
District, to the south. After the Norfolk  Southern merger, specifically
after Ricky Lee Gates in 1984 left some CR  B30-7s standing on the mainline
north of Baltimore in front of an Amtrak  train, freight traffic was forced
off the N.E. Corridor. NS began putting  these trains westward over the
Manassas Branch to Riverton Junction, then  north to Hagerstown. The crews,
now mostly ex-RF&P crews who have taken  a buyout then gone to work for NS,
(as the ex-SR old heads had taken the  buy-out and retired), operated on
these trains which required radio train  orders on the unsignaled branch
given by milepost. The mileposts on the  Manassas branch begin with a "B".
These radio train orders then specified a  "B" milepost which differentiated
them from trains on the old SR main to  Lynchburg. The ex-RF&P crews noticed
the "B" mileposts ended when they  reached the fully signaled Hagerstown
District at Riverton Junction, hence  the necessity of copying radio train
orders. In a sense of relief from the  necessity of repeating these radio
train orders these ex-RF&P guys  began calling the Hagerstown District the
"H" line. Of course the newbie  railfans listening with their first scanner
picked up on the "H"-line  nomenclature and it spread, via the internet. It
is my hope as a member of  the NW Mailing List, that when you hear this
termed tossed out, you will  politely correct these newbies, and remind them
that it is the Hagerstown  District, and not an "H" line.

Best,
Mason  Cooper


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