QUOTE: Originally posted by CShaveRR Historically, the two lines have been part of the same subdivision; Wisconsin freights used to get into and out of 40th Street that way. I have a feeling that those crossovers are easier to maintain than diamonds would have been (or that the angle's too sharp for diamonds). But I couldn't state for sure whether or not there were diamonds there at one time. I think that's what you're asking, right?
Years ago, the Green Bay freights used to proceed directly south through Milwaukee through the depot, to St. Francis, then on the Kenosha sub to Lake Bluff interlocking, (then directly south through Lake Forest, Highland Park, etc) rather than take the cutoff towards KO interlocking, then to Valley. These trains did turn SW at the interlocking between Central and Davis streets in Evanston (I cannot remember the name of the tower right now). This track proceeded west to Mayfair (refered to in another thread) on the Mayfair cutoff. This was way back in steam days, way before my time.
After the mayfair cutoff was downgraded to yard track, the 40th street trains used the Lake Bluff cutoff, then used the Milwaukee sub (then known as the New Line sub) to get to Vally interlocking, then proceeded south via the old North Shore tracks to 40th street via Mayfair.
I was so glad when the CNW closed 40th street yard. The tracks were so close together, there was not enough room for a person to SAFELY walk the train; the tracks were in such a bad neighborhood, that we had orders that if we encountered a problem with the train, we were not to get off the engine until a cop showed up. We were also told to lock the locomotive doors, and we were not to stop after hitting anything (other than a person). In addition, the "locals" wold do what they could to stop the train (putting whatever they could think of on the tracks, so they could open up the traincars and steal whatever they could. They would even put mannequins and/or dummies (clothes stuffed with paper or rags to resemble a person) to try to get us to stop. The guys in the caboose really had it bad; they would occasionally get shot at, or the caboose boarded. And if we had to stop, we tried our best to stop with the slack stretched so they could not pull the pins.
