Being into model railroading, chances are one would find their way to seeing Lance Mindheim's layouts of the East Rail and Downtown Spur district. I found my way actually by accident. When I googled "CSX Miami" in 2004 I found pictures of east rail. The whole thing seemed to escape me until I got back around '08 and found his site.
One goal emerged and it became clearer as I developed my YouTube "Career". Catch the jobs working these two areas. No one had ever posted videos of these trains and photos were extremely scarce. Of a present day operation, this one journalist who just got a photo of cars stopped by FPT and myself are probably the only folks who have accomplished it. I got lucky on three occasions and planned more.
On July 22, 2011, in the brink of time I managed to actually beat Y322 in a eureka moment to the Hialeah Yard Ready track around SX 1033.6. I don't know how; it was just pure luck when I saw northbound after northbound lined into Hialeah Yard and magically found 'it' in the sea of Tri-Rails. Because of the last minute shot I became inspired to leave a little earlier and get it a little deeper.
As an aside, I was hoping to get coal action on April 20 when Y220, instead of working the Lehigh Spur, went to East Rail. I knew that was a new pattern for Fridays and followed suit. I caught it working and pulling out of the NW 59 ST section of the Big Hole lead. Was a cool catch but now they run in daylight under job Y121. Tony scored them at Sentry.
Now on Monday I caught Y322 again, earlier as hoped but not doing what I wanted. The job was already stopped and waiting for lights back to Hialeah. I was a bit disappointed being late for any real action but seeing it is what counts. I have the photos up and videos will come sometime next week. Being a Monday it was also the shortest Y322 ever with 4 cars. I have hopes when I attempt it next Friday, June 29 that it will be longer. I don't think I can make a marked attempt to be up at 6:00 AM and head east at that time but can try. When I get older, however, I may plan to dog the train with friends. Since this train works earlier on Fridays as well, I may be able to sneak out at midnight and get him heading south. We'll wait and see.
Monday was a fun trip without any doubt. I did recon on the ex. SAL main that once connected to Downtown Miami. The results were not satisfactory with everywhere but the four nearby customers devoid of cars on the house tracks. It is still believed Family and Sons receives the way that ADMX tanker was on there so we can hope.
It is funny how people say this job is hard to catch. Truly just look at this blog and the answers are here. It is on duty 11:59 PM but usually leaves Hialeah Yard about 2:00 AM-3:00 AM. It will definitely be somewhere on that line after that time, probably first off around FPT/Miami Iron and later on around Cliff Berry Inc. At about 5:45-6:00 AM you can find them running their train around at NW 10 AV, but that changes based on how many eastbound trailing points have to be worked and the same for customers such as Florida Bottling and Proveedora Jiron. They will usually work Trujillo and Sun Gas being whoever is actually left. I suppose around 7:30-8:00 AM in the depths of the Tri-Rail ops you can find them arriving to their wait along N River Drive and then they get into the yard around 10:30 AM, the first clearing of Tri-Rail. If you want a shot in Hialeah, during the AM hours, you can wait on Tri-Rail P620 and he'll dog him. The mornings that this job is flat out guaranteed are Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. It is easy when you would be up for it. It can be challenging being in the area around 4 am but yet when you have company you are a little safer. They say 'strength in numbers' and with this job it works.
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