Freight House Traffic

I'm a bit away from having the freight house operational, as I haven't actually built the Whiting Street Yard yet. But as I was going through some paperwork I realized that I have everything I need to set up the freight house properly.

In the Freight Train and Package Car Schedules, there is a section in the back for Arranged Package Cars. This section tells you exactly what cars are inbound, and what is outbound at the freight house, including what train picks them up.

For example, for New Britain there are cars for the following destinations in September 1947:

Picked up on ANE-1

• Chicago via the PRR
• Philadelphia Transfer via PRR
• Pittsburgh 11th St. via PRR

Picked up by AO-5 (All Tue-Thu-Sat except Waterbury which is daily)

• Cincinnati via L&H-CNJ-RDG-WMD-B&O
• East St. Louis via NYC (OA-5 to Bridgeport then EI-2 to State Line)
• Hornell Transfer via ERIE
• Scranton via L&H-DL&W
• Utica via NYC (OA-5 to Bridgeport then EI-2 to State Line)
• Waterbury

Picked up by YN-1

• St. Albans via CV (YN-1 to Cedar Hill then NM-4 to New London) (Tue-Thu-Sat)
• Cedar Hill Transfer 

Picked up by HDX-5 (Tue-Thu-Sat)

• Middletown, CT - the car is from Harlem River, transferred via HDX-5 to Hartford, then HDX-7 (the Valley Local) to Middletown. So I could actually coordinate this with Chris for his sessions if we wanted to.

Inbound cars are from:
Cedar Hill Transfer on NY-2
Maybrook on OA-2 (Tue-Thu-Sat only)
New York (Harlem Sta.) on NY-2

So I'll need 3 unloading spots and 12 loading spots at the freight house, which always for the same destinations. Cincinnati, E. St. Louis, Hornell Transfer, Scranton, Utica, St. Albans, and Middletown be at the rear of the tracks, because they are pulled only on Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday.

Because the freight house is double-tracked and they would use bridge plates to access all of the cars, the house tracks will need to accommodate 8 cars each. This is perfect to know right now because I'm working on the layout of the yard.

Note that it's possible to have more volume than one car per destination or origination, the crew would just need to switch out cars when there is a surplus. I doubt there will be a surplus for the cars pulled only 3 times a week, because they would be daily jobs if the traffic warranted.

This information is also helpful when I get around to creating waybills for the through freights, because I have the information for all of the freight houses that are feeding those freights.

But wait! There's more!
As a bonus, here's the information for Middletown, CT which Chris will need for his layout:

No outbound destinations are arranged. Inbound traffic is from New Britain as noted (which would arrive the next day, or Monday, Wednesday, and Friday), and Cedar Hill Transfer daily (on the Airline local). All of the other freight houses on the Valley or Air Line aren't listed.

LCL by Truck
This doesn't mean that the freight house or bulk tracks don't ship out. Just that there aren't arranged destinations. So if an industry not served by the railroad needed to ship out, they would have to have the freight agent order a car. However, unless the load will nearly fill the car, it wouldn't be terribly cost effective. Instead, it would go via truck service (which is in the following section in the schedules) to a centralized freight house to be loaded in that direction.

• From New Britain that would be truck route A-11 to Hartford.
• From Cromwell, Middletown and Portland, A-6 to Hartford.
• Wethersfield to Cromwell is A-4 to Hartford. Middletown to Amston and Colchester would be N-1 to New Haven
• The rest of the Air Line and the lower Valley, N-13 to New Haven.
• Deep River to Saybrook would be trucked to New London on route M-1. 

These trucking routes also brought in LCL to the same freight houses that weren't served directly by arranged freight service.

These smaller LCL loads that are handled by truck would be added to the trains that have arranged routes where possible, including those that would then be transferred to truck.

"Peddler Cars"
The other option is for an industry that has several small loads to multiple destinations. As long as they can fill the car enough to make it economical, the industry would ship from the freight house via a single car to multiple destinations. I have some O&W freight house that shows that this was a regular approach for several of the industries there.