masthead_shortlines
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Turtle Creek Industrial Railroad

tckr_state The Turtle Creek Industrial Railroad is an 11 mile Pennsylvania shortline located just east of Pittsburgh, running from a Norfolk Southern connection at Trafford northeast to Export.  The line owned by Dura-Bond, which operates a small steel processing plant at the end of the line in Export. Currently, the only other online shipper is a lumber yard in Murrysville. The TCKR line is the former Pennsylvania Railroad's Export branch, later operated by Conrail. The shortline rescued the line from abandonment in 1982.

Motive Power

Turtle Creek Industrial #462

  • builder:Electro Motive Division
  • model:SW1
  • type:B-B yard switcher
  • built:Aug 1949, EMD #7509
  • series:660 produced 1939-53
  • engine:EMD 567 (6 cyls. 600 hp)
  • notes:
  • ex Johnstown & Stoney Creek #462
    ex Union Railroad #462
  • builder

    Turtle Creek Industrial #550

  • builder:Electro Motive Division
  • model:NW2
  • type:B-B yard switcher
  • built:Oct 1949, EMD #8534
  • series:1119 produced 1939-49
  • engine:EMD 567A (12 cyls. 1000 hp)
  • notes:
  • ex Union Railroad #550
  • builder

    Locations

    Lagniappe

    journal_rwh

    Turtle Creek Industrial #462 Even a frustrating day railfanning beats a normal day in the office.

    Still, when you follow a small pike from one end to another, you want to see the locomotive -- the proverbial pot at the end of the circuitous shortline rainbow. When my railfan buddy Ben Wells and I set out to track the little Turkle Creek line near Pittsburgh from its interchange to its dead end, we followed the creek and the rails all the way northwest, but rolled into the borough of Export having found no engine along the way. Frustrating. The sun was getting low in the west, and we concluded that line must have been abandoned. (We had observed several roadbed washouts on the drive into town.) Still, we noticed that the "end of the line" in town did not, in fact, look like the end ... tracks seemed to push through the woods just a little farther. Sure enough, out at the far end of the town we discovered their aging NW2 looking worse for the wear. Could this be the online locomotive? Surely not. A shop worker met us outside, and kindly tipped us off to the hiding place of the real TCKR power. We found her, just as he said: back in Murrysville, safely bedded down behind bars, tucked into the back of the local lumberyard. She looked great, given her age ... but the chain link, padlocks, and warning signs prevented better pictures. Frustrating. Even so, it all beats a day in the office.

    Links / Sources

    This page was updated on 2017-07-26