Tulsa Port of Catoosa

The white rock would have been limestone coming out of one of the quarries down along the port road (SH 266). Green hill Materials has a spur down there now where SKOL crosses 266, but that one opened after 2002, so I’m not sure what the source was for the material you saw.

 

Dale, I worked for the Frisco/BN/and BNSF from 1971 to 2010 when I retired, and I never knew of the MP using the Frisco track to make deliveries to the port. The closest MP trackage was at Claremore. If the MP did use our tracks to make these deliveries, it is certainly new information to me. I worked the final years of my career on Local/Road Switcher 467 which worked the industries in far east Tulsa and the POC. I enjoyed the work except for the call times that we had from time to time. We were supposed to be called around 6:00pm, but sometimes we wouldn't be called until well after midnight which played havoc with my off time the next day. We used the same power as local 466 which switched Williams and Claremore, and sometimes they would hog law or just have a long day. We wouldn't be called until their power was available, or we would go relieve them which made our night start late, also. We would drag the train past the port switch and back in for a distance of approximately two miles to the delivery tracks. The terrain was hilly which made handling the train critical because the conductor would be riding on the point. The worst experience we had was the day we were able to get into the port after the 2007 infamous ice storm. We hadn't been able to work our job for two nights, and when we did shove into the port, we found that the port rr had shoved their outbound cars all the way east of the Bird Creek bridge. I was still on the main with the engine. We had ahold of well over 200 cars. We had trouble communicating because of the terrain and getting air through that many cars because it was still cold. We did get some help on the radio issue when a messenger was sent to assist the conductor. It took me probably 30 minutes to get enough air through that many cars to finally be able to shove in the clear of the main and realign the main line switch and derail for mainline movement. All that time we had a westbound Z train stopped on the main at Verdigris because of our inability to clear the main in a reasonable time. Normally after we delivered our cars and picked up the outbound cars, we would shove the outbound cut around the wye at the port and then back to the main stopping short of the derail, and get authority to enter the main for west bound move back to the yard. This day, however, because we had so many cars for the yard, we just tied onto them on the east end and drug them back to the derail where we were relieved by a dog catch crew who would take the train to Verdigris to run around them for the west bound move. I guarantee you I was happy to get off that engine that morning because of the stress of having the main blocked for so long, and having as many cars as I did with the potential of tearing up the cut. We also had the crossings at the port blocked for a long time because of the number of cars we had.
Terry

 

"...I guarantee you I was happy to get off that engine that morning because of the stress of having the main blocked for so long, and having as many cars as I did with the potential of tearing up the cut. We also had the crossings at the port blocked for a long time because of the number of cars we had.
Terry[/QUOTE]

Wow! Appreciate you sharing these experiences.

 

Terry, I always enjoy your stories about life on the rails. What was the furthest away from home did you go for Frisco?

Joe

 

Hi Terry,

I stand corrected, I slipped MP in there not on purpose. But yes MP did go through Claremore, across the diamond. It never did end up on Frisco/BN/BNSF at the port!
But you have a way better understanding of the railroad situation here than I ever will. I had a friend that grew up in the Claremore-Oologah areas and he remembered MP in Claremore back in the steam days and forward. I loved to hear his stories. He passed many years ago.

I have a question, you mention in the ice storm aftermath that you had blocked the main at Catoosa with over 200 cars, were those all destined for the port? I have never seen that much traffic down there. But then again, I'm looking from outside the fence. I appreciate your sharing the story. Please feel free to chime in here when you feel like it.

Thanks for telling us some history!
Dale

 

Track Schematic of the POCR.

 

A fellow club member and master model builder brought in the Meteor this morning to run on the club layout. I thought I’d post up a few pictures for You all.
Enjoy!

 

Yes Jim, indeed it is. Kevin had to build up the top of the boiler to make it flat on top. He added all the piping and also had to shorten the tender. It has DCC and sound. It is quite impressive to watch it run.

The only “mistake” on it is that it is painted to match the Frisco Meteor on display at Redfork in West Tulsa. The original Meteor when it came out of the shops, it was black below the running boards. The drivers are correct and the rods as well. Unfortunately it was finished when he found that out.
Quite honestly, I did not know that, he pointed it out. Mistake or not it is absolutely gorgeous in real life. I would be proud to have it any day, and I’m a diesel guy.

The Meteor pulled heavyweight cars.

Fun day at the club today!

 

My wife and I went to Owasso so I could take some photos of the SKOL rail yard. It's been a long time sense I have been there, a lot of infrastructure has been built in the recent years.

The photos below were taken Saturday afternoon and the sky was overcast so the photos didn't come out the way I wanted. Need to go in the morning on a sunny day.

Joe

 

Sorry to be so slow, Joe to respond to your question, but I have not been line for several days. Sherman, Texas was the farthest I went from Tulsa on the Frisco. That interdivisional run did not last very long because of the inability to get over the road under the law, so Sherman was eliminated along with Francis with Madill becoming the new division point.
I was in the engineer's program while we were running to Sherman. I remember one particularly bad trip when we were first out to come north, but a train derailed on a bridge on the SP which we used between Denison and Sherman. It was a very bad derailment with a long repair time expected. The officials decided to use the Frisco/Katy connection track at Sherman which was not in very good shape. My engineer trainer had to pull our long train through that connection track at below 5 mph while several men were watching the wheels for any sign of a problem. He got the train through in good shape and we proceeded down the Katy through their yard to get back onto the Frisco. It was dark and I don't remember anything about the Katy track and yard, but I have never forgotten that experience. That would have been sometime in the spring or summer of 1973.
Terry

 

Dale, the cut of cars I mentioned was the combined inbound and outbound cars. The reason we had the crossings in the port blocked for so long was that after the brakes released on the outbound cars that we had tied into, we had to shove those cars further into the port on their railroad so that we could then shove our cars onto the inbound delivery track. This shove fouled the two crossings into the port. We were on those crossings for a long time. I can only imagine what the traffic that was blocked looked like.

Another memory I have of an unusual move at the port was the night a unit grain train was inbound from KC to be delivered to the port. We were in the clear on the port lead and stopped the southbound train when he cleared the switch. We tied into the rear of the train and drug it east and then shoved the entire train into the port. Even though the train was heavy (about 100 cars) and long, it was actually easy to control because of the uniform car lengths and weight. The conductor who was riding the point told me it was the smoothest ride he had had into the port. Because of the changes of elevation on the lead, our radios failed, and we resorted to using our cell phones which was a rules violation. It was the only way we were able to communicate, so we didn't care what the officials might have thought if they ever found out.
Terry

 

Hi Terry,

Thank you for taking time to reply. Those are some big trains, what were you all using for power to move them?

Again, thanks for taking time to answer.
Dale

 

Dale, we were not restricted at the port on the type of units we could use out there, but we were restricted to four axle units on one of the industrial leads, so usually that was the type of units we had. If we had a six axle unit in the consist, we would have to switch it out before working that lead. That was time consuming, so the trainmasters tried to keep six axle units off of our consist. Sometimes it couldn't be helped because of availability problems that came up from time to time. Usually our consist was the same consist that 466 would use during the day. On Monday they would generally have a very heavy train out of Williams of liquid fertilizer. It could be as high as 10,000 tons, so they would need sufficient power for that much tonnage. Our typical consist would consist of the following units in varying hp combinations: GP 38, 39, 50, 60M, and 60B. We also would have an 8-40BW thrown in from time to time.
Terry

 

I have a question for the experts. If you saw my pictures of the Frisco Meteor above, what year did the Frisco stop using that locomotive for service to Tulsa?

Thanks,
Dale

 

Thank you yardmaster, we are planning a fun-run day at the club featuring steam and 1st gen diesel motive power on the layout. We are also starting a YouTube Channel for the club. The first video will feature the Meteor along with other steam locomotives and 1st gen diesel. I’ll post up about once we get the video done and on the channel.

Thank you for taking time to answer.

BTW, for those of you in the Tulsa area, if you are interesting in joining the club, we now have an Associate Membership level available. PM me if you are interested.

 

I did a bit of train watching today down at the port. I was too late to see them bringing cars into the port, but I caught them leaving. I caught this old-timer at where the SKOL crosses State Highway 266.

 

Dale, how are you doing? Have you been able to work on your layout lately?

I will send you a PM about the club you mentioned in a above post.

Joe