The CSX Charleston Subdivision is part of the CSX A Line, which was the Atlantic Coast Line's mainline from Richmond, VA, to Tampa, FL. The Charleston Sub runs from Florence, SC, to Savannah, GA, via its namesake city of Charleston, SC.
While this section of the A Line was built by two different railroads, both were under the control of the ACL by 1903, and have remained a relatively major rail corridor along the eastern seaboard in the years since, unlike the parallel Seaboard Air Line's mainline (the "S Line").
In 1967, the ACL and SAL merged into the Seaboard Coast Line, and in doing so, decided to prefix all of their mileposts with the letter each railroad started with (A for former ACL trackage, S for former SAL trackage). While most lines has prefixes two to three characters long, the two railroads' mainlines were just prefixed with A and S, respectively, leading to the ACL's mainline being called the "A Line", after its prefix.
This line sees a good variety of freight traffic along it, along with two Amtrak services: the Silver Meteor and the Palmetto. Traffic does seem to fluctuate along it at times, as some days you'll barely see anything despite waiting all day while other days you'll see a pretty decent number of trains.
This line is also the part of the A Line that, IMHO, retains the best crossing equipment. The small portion of the line is pretty boring and well modernized by CSX, featuring all 12x24 inch LED lights, it does still retain a couple of mechanical bells, one Safetran (on a late-70s SCL install) and one WCH (on an 80s SBD install), the latter of which is also at a crossing that still features a WCH gate mech. However, once you get across the Savannah River into South Carolina, the crossing equipment gets a lot more interesting fast.
In South Carolina, the line still features a large amount of SCL, SBD, and older CSX installs, with much of the equipment along it having been installed in the 70s and 80s, it appears. There's also a decent bit of newer CSX stuff, of course, but also even a good few ACL-era installs north of Charleston, though most of them seem to only retain the old masts.
There are plenty of 8 inch lights along the line as well, with most of them being a mix of WRRS, Safetran, and WCH 8 inch lights, though some Federal Signal, WABCO, Harmon, and even some ACL-era US&S 8 inch lights are mixed in, with at least one pair of the US&S 8 inch lights retaining their original vandal guards over the lenses. Even with all of the 8 inch lights, there's still a large number of 12 inch lights as well, with the line featuring US&S, WCH, Safetran, Modern Industries, Harmon, Federal Signal, and even RACO 12 inch lights across it. A fair number of these 12 inch lights seem to have been upgraded to LED over the years, but a good few do still remain incandescent as well.
As far as gate mechs go, most of them appear to be WCH and Safetran gate mechs from the 70s and newer, but there are some WABCO and US&S Model 75 gate mechs around if you know where to look. There's even still an old ACL-era WRRS gate mechanism along the line in Coward, SC, which I believe is the only surviving WRRS gate mech on the entire A Line.
There are also a good few older cantilevers along the line too, such as some Walpar and Harmon cantilevers from the SCL. You can also find a good few RACO cantilevers from the early SCL along the line as well, and there is even still a pair of ACL(?)-era WRRS cantilevers near Moncks Corner, SC.
Of course, there's also a good variety of older and newer e-bells. There are plenty of NEG e-bells and a good few GS Type 2s it appears, courtesy of CSX, but there's also a lot of mechanical bells as well, and at least one GS Type 1 (in Kingstree, SC). Most of these are WCH mechanical bells from the SCL, SBD, and CSX, it appears, but there are also a healthy number of 1st and 2nd Generation Safetran mechanical bells along the line as well. A good few WRRS bells, from both the ACL and early SCL, still exist along the line, along with some US&S mechanical bells, a few Modern Industries mechanical bells, at least four Federal Signal mechanical bells, and even a pair of US&S Teardrop bells installed by the ACL in Kingstree. These aren't the only Teardrops along the A Line, as a rather famous pair exists in Latta, SC, up on the South End Sub, but they're still rather neat to see, nonetheless.
All in all, this is a rather great line, and I'm glad to have been able to make a few different trips to it over the past year.
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