| Looking at the remnants of
Pennsy's Claremont Branch today, it would seem hard to fathom that the
area it served was once vibrant enough to generate enough business for
two major railroads to vigorously compete for customers. The Claremont
area, much of which is now called the Crossroads Industrial Park is now
home to some localized industry and sees a decent amount of truck traffic
and apparently no railhead traffic whatsoever. Though CSX trains
routinely pass through the nearby Claremont Yard several times daily, the rail traffic generated
by the Claremont area itself is particularly light.
This is a far cry from a century ago,
when Claremont was the location of Baltimore's sprawling stockyards, centered
around Brunswick Street south of Wilkens Avenue. The industry and
it's adjacent neighborhood sprang up in large thanks to the heavy workload
provided to the yards by the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad, now operated
by CSX Transportation. However, Baltimore's other major rail player,
the Pennsylvania Railroad was no to be left out of the Claremont bonanza.
In the late 19th Century, they constructed a branch leading from the mainline
just east of the Catonsville Branch connection that craftily crept its
way onto the B&O territory. Among the advantages of shipping
via the PRR was undoubtedly the ability to reach New York City without
interchanging.
Map showing the entire
Claremont Branch of the PRR. Tracks to left are the PRR corridor,
tracks in lower right are B&O (CSX) Claremont Yard, while line in
top right is the Tidewater Branch of the WM. Blue Ticks show
photo locations.
However, the heyday of the
Claremont
Branch would eventually come to a close, particularly when MASH's hams
left their old Dukeland Street facility. The exact date of
abandonment
of the Claremont is not yet known, but is assumed to be in either the
late
1970s or early 1980s. Most of the line today is largely
overgrown, but otherwise
intact, and might actually be passable by actual cars were it not for
the
vegetation. Still another portion of the line has been
reconfigured to lead into CSX (ex B&O) tracks, so as to offer rail
service to at least one industry in the Claremont area. An
interchange track had existed between the PRR and the B&O, but this
has been long taken up in redevelopment of a printing facility near the
end of Wilmarco Street.
The Claremont is not necessarily dead
however. MARC is looking to rebuild the line in the next 10 years
(including electrification) to allow access of Penn Line Trains into Camden
Station, as well as allow for equipment moves between the Penn Line and
a proposed MARC maintenance facility at Carroll Park. Time and money
will only tell wether the Claremont will be reborn into new boom times,
or continue to bust into a forgotten chapter of Baltimore railroad history.
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1. Just East of its divergence from the PRR main, the Claremont crossed
this plate girder bridge over Caton Avenue, which now stands overgrown.
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2. From the foot of Longwood Street, one can see just how shabby the
old line has become. Though built to heavy PRR standards, it is
hard to decipher in this photo.
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2. Looking East from the about the same location, there is little
besides the utility poles to track the line's passage. The
railway is largely submerged in scrub and dirt.
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3.
Bridge 0.60 spanning Wilkens Avenue shows a lighter construction than
the Caton Avenue trestle. As such, by the 1940's it was
restricted to A, B, and H-6 class locomotives at a top speed of 10
miles an hour. Still, the sight of a train on this bridge would
certainly seem impressive.
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4. Though heavily overgrown
in spots, one can still detect the impressive heavy construction of the
branch, as this view of the main shows.
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4. The spur leading from this
junction headed East-Northeast to meet to B&O at Claremont Yard, as well as to service several industries.
Another "mainline" track is buried in the scrub on the right.
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5. Better kept than the rest of the Claremont, this switch from the
service track in the prior photo still sees some use under CSX.
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5. Likely the last active switch on the Claremont, this controller gets an occasional tug.
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5. Looking towards the camera in the view above, a recent photo shows
maintenance work has left the switch and lead immaculate. Behind
the trees to the left are far more overgrown trackage.
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6. The Claremont in "action" shows a box car resting along the spur in the foreground of the view to left.
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6. The rails leading to a dead end near the lower right corner, seen in
this view, must certainly now continue on to connect to the CSX yard in
Claremont, as there is no other way for the boxcar at left to access
the national railroad system otherwise.
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