Railroad Building

While drivng through Walkerton, Indiana, I came upon a CSX railroad yard and noticed an odd shaped building right next to a seldom used crossing marked with only a stop sign on a crossbuck.
csxbuildinggates Click to enlarge

Here's a view that shows the width of the building.
csxbuilding Click to enlarge

Maybe Eddie can give me an idea of what this building may have been.

It looks as though it's not in use anymore, but it's in relatively good shape.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

The building looks like it's an interlocking tower leftover from the days of manual switching.

Eddie said...

This building was used to control train traffic at the crosstracks behind the building. These buildings are called Manual Interlocking Towers. In the days before satalite communications and GPS tracking, buildings like this controlled and dispatched train traffic, usually where two railroads met at leval, or interchanged trains on each others lines. Many have been torn down because they are now unfortunately Obsolete. Tower B-12 is preserved on display in downtown Franklin Park Illinois, as is Spaulding Tower at the Illinois Railway Museum in Union Illinois.

Thank You.
Eddie.

A picture of Tower B-12 can be seen at My blog site
http://eddiesrailroad.blogspot.com

Tom Gill said...

Thanks, Eddie.

I'll have to take another photo of the building from the opposite angle - I think there is a diamond (if that's the correct term, two tracks intersecting.) right behind the building.

Eddie said...

Hi Tom.
Man! You are good!
You are absolutely right. "Diamond" is the correct term for railroad crosstracks. Congratulations! You just won a trip to the "Twin Citties"!
Cicero -Berwyn! (Ber-wyn!? )
Ha ha ha!
I would definately like to see some more photos of this particulair inrerlocking tower.

Thank You.
Eddie.