Berea Trainwatching Tips

Welcome Visitors!

Visiting railfans always are welcome at Berea.

If you have never been here -- or have not been here recently -- here are some tips to help you enjoy your stay. We want you, and all railfans, to be safe and enjoy their time at Berea.

You'll usually find several "regulars" trackside who will be happy to answer your questions and provide information.

Please click on any of the topics, below, to go to the full item:

•  Getting Here

•  Parking

•  Food & Beverage (and "Facilities")

•  Three Simple Requests

•  Scanner Frequencies

•  Berea Tower Boarded Up

•  Berea Rail History

Getting Here:

This is rather complicated while the long-needed Front St. bridge is being built over the NS and CSX tracks. The heavy construction work started on May 4, 2009, and will last well into 2011. Please see, below, for the latest information that we have on this project. We'll provide more details here once we get a clearer picture of the construction work.

We have heard reports that NS is planning some major track work Berea while the bridge work is in progress, but we have not yet seen anything definite from the railroad. NS did major work at Berea in the Summer of 2009, replacing the old NYC-style signals and gantries with new NS-style units.

Update On The Front Street Bridge Project

Front Street (Ohio Rt. 237) is being bridged over both the NS and CSX tracks from Emerson St. on the north to Lou Groza Blvd. on the south. Depot St. has been angled to connect with Groza Blvd. The project got under way in May, 2009, and will last until early 2011.

Front St. south of Depot St. is open to traffic, as is the intersection. Do not try to go north of Depot St.; while the bridge over CSX is in, it currently is solely for access to the industries on either side of Front St. north of the CSX tracks.

As an alternate route to reach the Berea railfanning site -- which still is open and available to you  --  please take Rocky River Dr. to Depot St. (just south of the rail underpasses) and then go east on Depot St. to the parking areas.

From I-480 westbound, exit to Cleveland Airport; head south on Ohio Rt. 237 past the airport to Berea; bear right (south) at the "Y" intersection onto Rocky River Dr.; after passing both sets of tracks, turn left (east) onto Depot St. and you're there.

From I-480 eastbound, exit at Grayton Rd., turn right to Brookpark Rd. (Ohio Rt. 15). Drive east on Brookpark past the airport to the Ohio Rt. 237 South Exit. Head south on Ohio 237 past the airport to Berea; bear right (south) at the "Y" intersection onto Rocky River Dr.; after passing under both sets of tracks, turn left (east) onto Depot St. and you're there.

From I-71, exit at Bagley Rd., turn left, and go west to Rocky River Dr. in Berea; turn right (north) on Rocky River Dr.; just before reaching the tracks, turn left onto Depot St. and you're there.

You'll find a map of the suggested alternate route on the main Berea page.

Parking:

There are two parking places regularly used by railfans.

•  The western end of the former restaurant's parking lot -- at least for the present time; this is subject to change at any time. Please do not park east of the restaurant; that area now is reserved for construction equipment and workers.

•  The grass lot on the south side of Depot St. about 200 feet west of the restaurant lot (and the shade here is nice on a hot summer day!).

Please do not park in any business driveways during Mon.-Fri. business days.

Hilliard Electric, on the south side of Depot St., was liquidated in late 2009, and its driveways now are, at least temporarily, available for railfan parking.

Parking for railfanning at Berea is very critical now that the Front St. Bridge project has begun. All railfans will very much appreciate everyone's cooperation by parking only in the designated parking areas.

Food & Beverage (and "Facilities")

The Station Restaurant closed in late 2008, after 28 years of operation, and we do not know whether another restaurant will open in the building.

The restaurant's closing has not affected railfan parking in the western end of the lot (see above); however, railfans should be aware that parking there could be restricted or banned.

Fast-food restaurants are located north of the tracks on Front Street and west of the tracks on Bagley Road.

Unfortunately, there are no "facilities" readily available to railfans, other than visiting one of the restaurants or gas stations.

Motels. for railfans staying overnight, are in the Bagley Rd.-I-71 area east of Berea.

Three Simple Requests:

There are three simple but important requests for all railfans -- both visitors and "regulars" -- at Berea to help keep the area available to everyone.

"Take only pictures, leave only footprints." Please take your trash with you when you leave. All railfans will appreciate your doing so.

Please stand well clear of the tracks, and be aware of where you are standing. Things which can hurt you can and do frequently fly off the trains.

• And this is especially important on CSX since the railroad, now that bridge construction is under way, is adopting "quiet zone" operating practices and do not always blow their horns. A train could sneak up on you unannounced.

Please DO NOT walk on, cross, or allow children to play on the tracks The CSX tracks (the near pair) are built for 70 mph -- and the trains often run that fast!

Berea Tower is not open to visitors. The Berea City Police, and the railroads' (especially CSX), police departments, rigorously enforce rail-trespassing laws which carry a heavy fine and possible jail time.

Scanner Frequencies:

These are the radio frequencies for your scanner while at Berea:

•  CSX "IG" Dispatcher - Berea-Greenwich - 160.485

•  CSX "IG" Dispatcher - Berea-Greenwich - 160.860

  • • In 2/09, CSX reassigned the Columbus Line from Berea to Greenwich from the "IF" dispatcher to the "IG" dispatcher (who also controls the Short Line to Collinwood), but this expanded territory retains the former "IF" frequencies.

•  CSX Columbia Detector - 160.860 (A little difficult to hear)

•  CSX "IG" Dispatcher - Berea-Collinwood - 160.800

•  CSX "IG" Dispatcher - Collinwood - 160.995

•  NS Cleveland Terminal Dispatcher - 161.070

•  NS Rockport Yardmasters - 161.070 and 160.350

•  NS Toledo East Dispatcher - 160.980

•  NS Olmsted Falls Detector - 160.980

(Quite difficult to hear)

NS and CSX trains call signals, and talk to their respective dispatchers, when passing through Berea (although sometimes CSX crews don't do so.)

Berea Tower Boarded Up!

In February, 2006, NS workers boarded up most of the windows on both floors of the closed Berea Tower. The only windows left unboarded are two at the southeast end which are in the signal maintainers' office area.

The board-up was done because of leaks in the windows which let rain and snow into the building, as well as to prevent vandalism.

We were sorry to see this happen, but NS needs to protect the building, and the electronics which it still contains, from further damage. We hope that NS eventually will send a crew back to paint the window boards.

A Brief Berea Rail History:

Berea has been a major factor on the Cleveland railroad scene since the mid-1860s when several predecessors of the New York Central System (NYC) laid their tracks on roughly the same alignment as what you see today.

The Berea Union Depot, now the forner Station Restaurant, dates from 1878 and was the city's passenger station until 1958.

Depot Street was not a through street until the late 1960s; originally it ended at the depot and at St. Mary's Cemetery. The area west of the depot, including most of the present street, contained a freight house, a team track, a yard serving local industries, and a yard for the spur which ran down to the Berea sandstone quarries, now Baldwin and Wallace Lakes in the Metropark.

At one time Berea had two towers, one near Front St., the other at the west end. Two steam engines were regularly kept at Berea to protect the passenger services; if a train needed help, one of these engines was sent to assist.

Berea, as you see it today, is at least the third rebuilding of the interlocking which was done in the late 1950s, with some modification in 1999. At the height of the NYC, later PennCentral, the "Chicago Line"-- today's NS route -- had four tracks. The inner pair (Tracks 1 and 2) were for high- speed passenger and freight trains, and the outer pair (now cut back to Track 4 and the North Controlled Siding) were for regular freight and slower passenger trains.

CSX's "Columbus Line" is the ex-NYC "Big Four Route," and originally was the main passenger route from Cleveland Union Terminal (CUT). It had three tracks through Berea Depot, and two tracks west of there, but in the late 1970's Conrail reduced these to a single track (CSX Track 1). CSX reinstalled Track 2 as part of the 1999 Conrail breakup. At one time high-speed crossovers west of the depot connected the "Chicago" and "Big Four" lines for passenger trains in and out of the Berea Depot and CUT.

Berea Tower closed in 1997 and its functions were transferred to Conrail's, now NS', dispatching center in Dearborn, MI, which controls the "Chicago Line" with NS "Cleveland Terminal" and "Toledo East" dispatchers, with some local control from Rockport Yard.

CSX's "IG" dispatcher at its Indianapolis center dispatches both the "Columbus Line" and the "Short Line." In 2009 CSX extended the IG dispatcher's territory from CP 13 (West Rd., Berea), all the way to Greenwich (CP 54), about 50 miles from Berea as part of a realignment of dispatching territories in Ohio.

The tower's first floor contains electronic control equipment for signals and switches. NS signal maintainers use the second floor as their office. NS boarded up the tower in early 2006 because of water leakage and for security.

In the NYC/PC/CR days, there were frequent crossover moves, controlled by the Berea Tower operator, between the "Chicago" and "Big Four" lines. Since the Conrail breakup NS and CSX infrequently use the "Toledo Connection," usually when there are track work, derailments, problems, or special moves involved.

The "Big Four Connection" sees a Wheeling & Lake Erie coke train (708/707) to or from Arcelor Mittal Steel in the "Flats" six days a week -- usually Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays eastbound; Wednesdays, Fridays, and Sundays westbound -- although the W&LE train service has been reduced in frequency during the current economic slowdown..

NS' Rockport Yard, visible from I-480 just east of the airport, is its main Cleveland yard, from where NS trains run across the Lakefront to reach the former Pennsylvania RR route to Pittsburgh and the east, as well as serving several local customers on the west side of Cleveland.

CSX's main yard is Collinwood (exxx-NYC, exx-PC, ex-CR) on Cleveland's northeast side, reached via the "Short Line," east of Berea, paralleling I-480, and then turning northeast past University Circle.

Berea is "CP 194" on NS -- 194 miles from Buffalo because NS uses the former NYC mileage measurements on the "Chicago Line." On CSX Berea is "MP 21.5", based on the mileage from Collinwood Yard via CUT, although some CSX train crews recently have begun using "CP 194" when calling signals through Berea.

An average of 160 trains a day in normal economic times -- weighted a little more to NS than to CSX -- pass through Berea. NS' activity is fairly steady throughout the day, while CSX tends to fleet eastbounds in the morning, westbound in the afternoon. Train frequency on both roads, as well as the W&LE trains, have been reduced, and train lengths increased, during the current economic slowdown.