A veteran dispatcher avoids trouble in the 1980s

摘要

FORTY YEARS AGO, there were no computer-assisted dispatching aids on the Norfolk & Western. A dispatcher who got himself into trouble had to get himself out of trouble. This is one tale of how I got out of a dreaded "double saw" meet when both trains are too long for the siding. The maneuver involves splitting both trains in two pieces to complete the meet. In 1979,I bid on a first-trick job on the Detroit-Huntington (Ind.) District at Fort Wayne, Ind. The job also included 49 miles of the Delta District between Mont-pelier and Maumee, Ohio, a suburb of Toledo. This trackage, once part of the Wabash's Fourth District, was not governed by centralized traffic control, instead relying on track authorities issued verbally by the dispatcher. The railroad ran two Montpelier-Delta turns each day to pick up Ford Motor Co. traffic interchanged with the Detroit, Toledo & Ironton at Delta. The DT & I was a conduit for automotive traffic in and out of Detroit, both parts and finished automobiles. It crossed the N&W and Conrail on a high fill at Delta, a legacy of its time under Ford ownership.