This map is available here as a PDF
RAILFAN GUIDES of the U.S.
Todd's Railfan Guide to
BALTIMORE MD
the North East side of Baltimore and adjoining Baltimore County
MARC Car Shops
MARC Martin Station
ex Pennsy Stemmers Run Station
ex Pennsy Bay Tower
CSX's Bayview Yard
NS's Bayview Yard
Old Pennsy Catenary Supports
Highlandtown
RAILFAN GUIDES HOME
RAILROAD SIGNALS HOME
Guide Home Maps Hiways Hotels Intro Railroad Sights Links Photos Busses Bio's
The map below shows the northeast corner of Baltimore and the adjacent area in Baltimore County. This area contains the two Bayview yards and the two lines headed "north" to Wilmington and Philadelphia. The CSX line still has all of it's CPL's in place, except for the ones that have been replaced just west of Bayview yard (and the wye next to Rt 40, at the railfan spot).
On this map, you will find the two main yards of Baltimore for both CSX and Norfolk Southern (Bayview and Bayview), the shared NEC line with Amtrak and NS, the MARC Commuter station at Martins, the old Pennsy depot at Stemmers Run, and a detail of the Highlandtown area (not that there's a whole lot there, it's mostly for historical reference. There is no Light Rail or Metro in this section, nor any of the shortlines or any former Western Maryland trackage.
Note: even though the B&O's tracks went north and south, the B&O referred to the directions as East (north) and West (south). I use the north and south terms mostly, only because it is easier to reference to the maps.
Please Note: As of February 2011, the Mohrs Lane bridge over the CSX was closed.
It's difficult to get all of the little street names on the map without cluttering it up, so make sure you take along a good map of the Baltimore area. ADC puts out a good book map of the area, DeLorme's is so-so, I would go with ADC's. Thomas also has an excellent map book out on Baltimore, slightly more expensive tho. If you belong to AAA, they have a pretty good map, even tho they now put everything on one map (they used to have 3 or 4 for the area, and if you can find someone that wants to let loose with the set, GRAB IT!).
As far as food and other services go, Belair Road has a lot, the Whitemarsh Mall area has a lot, and the new Golden Ring center between RT 40 and Philadelphia Rd north of the Beltway has Sams, Walmart, and about half a dozen chow spots.
Color coding follows the keys on the map:
1
Yel/Grn are notable railroad attractions,
6
Blk/Grn is for signal locations, and
G
Blu/Whi is for
stuff in the Highlandtown area.
Most, if not all of the aerial pictures are from: http://www.bing.com/maps/
This map is available
here as a
PDF
Not much going on at the MARC carshops on this day.
A set of pictures taken on April 14th, 2011 by George L. Pitz.
George is one of the most active railfans in the Baltimore area and gets around!
He has a large number of excellent pictures available for viewing at:
http://p5b4702.rrpicturearchives.net/ ... Thanks to George for letting me
use his photos, and we look forward to more contributions from him.
A couple of shots of the Martins MARC Station before 43 was completed a few years ago.
3 ex Pennsy Stemmers Run Station
This depot is stuck away in a little travelled area of Baltimore County, and even few Baltimoreans know of it's existence. It's fairly easy to find off Rossville Blvd, and then Orems Rd. Thanks to Michael Watnoski for pointing out this station.
Mile Marker #87 sits near the station.
On The "Pennsy" Side
Hidden out of sight unless passing thru on an Amtrak train. There are also a bunch of signals and a storage track here.
Back in the Pennsy days, Bayview Yard was the largest of a number of yards they had in the area. Now under Norfolk Southern rule, it is one of three yards in the area for them, but by far, the biggest and most active.
Above shot, off of North Point Blvd, is where most of the NS
Bayview Yard operations is run out of... Back in the Pennsy's days, they had a
hump operation here. This is in the middle of the yard. Don't go in
here, as the NS cops patrol here with fair regularity.
The sub-station at Bayview.
North Point Blvd going under the Yard, at the top of the
above photo.
On the western end of the yard, NS has a building for the
police, some of the yard ops, and the Amtrak signal maintenance guys.
7 Old Pennsy Catenary Support Poles
Off Rolling Mill Rd, are these support poles leftover from the catenary days when the whole yard was electrified. Good detail shots if you're modelling this kind of thing.
A Norfolk Southern local that just came
out of the Lockheed Martin siding.
-- Pennsy / Amtrak Signals --
6 NEC signals adjacent to BAY Tower in Bayview Yard.
6a NEC signals just off the left side of the map.
There are four tracks here, and the signals handle all four in both directions.
7 NEC signals in the middle of Bayview Yard.
There are five tracks going under this signal bridge, four are signaled NB, and only one SB.
8 NEC signals towards the east end of Bayview Yard.
A bridge mounted set of three signals for SB traffic.
9 NEC signals at the east end of Bayview Yard.
Thee are four tracks going under the bridge here, three of them, the three away from the branch line, are signaled on the bridge... the forth track is signaled by a mast mounted signal several hundred feet to the west, shown to the right.
10 NEC signals and Interlocking under the Beltway Extension - Philadelphia Ave.
There are two sets of signal bridges, one on the north side of the Beltway, and one on the south side.
One of the few original Pennsy PL-5 signals remaining at this
location.
Some of the US&S PL-3 heads have been replaced by Safetran
signals.
Looking south towards the NB set of signals.
11 NEC signals under 695.
12 NEC signals along Orems Ave.
13 NEC signals adjacent to MD 43.
The signals here are on the north side of MD 43.
A SB Acela passing the Martin State Airport
station.
A SB Amtrak AEM-7 passing Martin's.
-- On The "B&O" Side --
Since the B&O had a multitude of yards in the Baltimore area, I guess they didn't feel (or have) the need to consolidate all of their operations to pretty much one yard as the Pennsy did. Of the two yards in the picture below, the upper one with the wye on the western end is CSX's.
The Bayview wye.
The eastern end of CSX's Bayview yard, with the wye to the
left.
The eastern end of CSX's Bayview yard.
-- CSX Signals --
1 Ebenezer Road - Grade Crossing
Besides being a good spot for both SB and NB freights, there is a set of intermediate signals just north of the crossing, and equipment detectors here. The signals are on the B&O drawings as WHITEMARSH, and the EB signal is 804, the WB is 803. Next signal set north of here is LORELEY, and south is POPLAR.
2 South of Mohrs Lane
This set of signals is on the B&O maps as POPLAR. The EB signal is 824, westbound is 825. The next set of signals east is WHITEMARSH. The next set of signals west (towards Baltimore) is at ROSSVILLE.
3 Interlocking at ROSSVILLE
This is where the two tracks coming out of Bayview converge into one for it's trip north (or east if you would) to Wilmington and Philadelphia. The signals here are absolute.
The two "NB" signals.
The single "SB" signal.
A SB CSX freight passing the signals at
Rosedale.
More trains! And we were only here for about 30
minutes....
A Very cool art deco style bridge takes the B&O over Rossville
Blvd.
Details of the switch.
The Rossville interlocking, the freight is heading into
Baltimore.
4 Off Chesaco
This set of signals is on the B&O maps as ROSEDALE. In looking at the map, these signals were apparently originally bracket mounted. The west track is main #1, the east track is main #2. EB #1 is signal 872. EB #2 is 870.... WB #1 is 871, and WB #2 is 873. The next set of signals north (east in B&O parlance) of here is ROSSVILLE. The next set of signals south (west) of here is on the other side of Bayview Yard, at BA TOWER, right off of Pulaski Hwy.
5 Off RT 40 and just west of Bayview - BA Tower
The above photo is a close-up of where the CSX main crosses RT
40, and the parking lot next to the siding at the upper left of the picture is
where railfans meet. The signals, also in the upper left, replaced CPL's
maybe 10 years ago. And last but not least, BA tower used to be just to
the left of Pulaski Hwy.
Todds Lane
Just north of Chesaco is Todds Lane, with some interesting crossing signs.
-- Stuff Around
Highlandtown
--
Mostly for Historical Purposes
A pretty good spot for catching freights coming out of either of the Bayview Yards is Lombard St, seen in the Highlandtown insert. Lombard Street goes over the NS and under CSX.
A Two B&O bridges into Highlandtown.
Coming off the above branch into Canton and Penn Mary yard, was a line going into Highlandtown. The abandoned bridge on the left goes over an abandoned line coming off the Pennsy main line that paralleled Haven Street, joining up with the current Pennsy/NS tracks under Orleans Street, and then wound up going up Boston Street towards the downtown area.
B First of two truss bridges on the B&O out of Bayview.
A close-up view of the CSX going over Amtrak's NEC, the first of two trestle's a freight going from Bayview Yard to Penn Mary yard will go over.
C Second of two B&O truss bridges on the way to Penn Mary, going over the Pennsy.
D Two RR bridges over Eastern Avenue.
E Everything going over the Eastern Avenue "underpass".
F Streetcar Barn and B&O branch into Hi'town
The end of the short B&O branch into Highlandtown, notice the curved building built to accommodate the tracks crossing Baltimore Street to the old Esskay Meat processing plant. On the right is what remains of the old streetcar barn on the corner of Eastern and Haven.
G The Pennsy's branch into Highlandtown.
The left picture is a close-up of the former Pennsy tracks into the Esskay plant, and the right picture shows both of the branches.
H Where the Pennsy's shortcut to Canton comes off the mainline, aka, Canton Junction.
I The MTA's Eastern Bus Shops.
Conveniently located off of Eastern Avenue on the fringe of Greektown, this is one of four MTA bus yards. Busses from here will have a small "E" with the number. If you like Greek food, there are many places along Eastern Ave between here and the "underpass" in Highlandtown.
J The B&O/Pennsy (CSX/NS) Interchange track.
This track comes off the CSX just after crossing "the first bridge" out of Bayview. I don't know how much it is currently being used, as Michael points out, it was put in to allow CSX coal trains access to Consolidated Coal, located at the water front in Canton. The NS end winds up coming in at the south end of the small intermodel yard.
Floobydust (Other Misc Stuff)
Also on this map...... Baltimore used to be one of only two
cities that had this type of interchange in the country. Now, with the
re-building of the interchange, it is sadly gone :-( The problem
with it, was that drivers had to get to the left, in the high speed / fast lane,
in order to exit the highway.... now, all of the exit ramps are to the right,
for going both ways on the diverging highway.
The official name for this type of interchange is "diverging windmill", but is
AKA a "knotted" interchange. Google knotted interchange for some
interesting reading!
2010-0514, 2005-1002,
New 4MAY2007....
Last Updated: 12/22/2011