Producer: John Pechulis
Locations: Cranton, Raritan, Allentown…
Timeframe: 1970s
Length: 68 minutes
Sources: many
Continuation of The Anthracite Railroads in the 70’s series by JPM. Volume 6 features Jersey Central. Coverage from Bayonne, NJ to Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania.
Here is the Central Railroad of New Jersey in the last years before the Conrail merger. Freight and Commuter service. Race trains, cab rides and a wreck are some of what is shown.
A single DVD-R. High quality film restoration. Soundtrack of environmental train sounds and narrative.
Main Chapter Menu by location. No maps. Narrated by Mike Bednar. He is a retired railroad employee with many years of experience.
CNJ vacated freight operations in Pennsylvania circa 1972. Lehigh Valley took that over. They interlined to Erie Lackawanna. Reading trains via trackage rights.
To the Trains… 👉
CNJ 1524 (GP7) is at Eport with a Monmouth Park Racetrack train.
Southbound freight at Bayway. Engine 2503 passes slowly. Jersey Turnpike is in the background.
Reading freight with GP35 power. This one is travelling to Philadelphia.
Cranford Yard action. Alco 1543 (RS-3) is switching at the yard.
Erie Lackawanna 3612 heads train ES99.
CNJ 3683 (GP40-P) at Raritan.
F units led by #10 are rolling at Lebanon. The #10 is a former B&O engine. Also in the show. The leased Norfolk and Western F units were originally Wabash locomotives.
Allentown area has much to see. Fairbanks – Morse 9702 on The Birdie.
Alco RSD engines smoke it up at the Allentown yard.
CNJ 2501 (SD35) departs and passes R Tower with freight. Allentown has good coverage of facilities. Lehigh Valley fans shall notice familiar locations before the takeover.
The big hook is rerailing Piggybacks at R Tower. There is a large wreck shown at Weissport in 1971.
AW-1 Cab Rides are the last chapter. Some different trains run across mostly unknown locations. Mike calls them out, but useless without a reference map. Much was shot from the second locomotive in the lash-ups.
Rockport Tunnel as seen from the cab on one of the rides.
The Anthracite Railroads in the 70’s Volume 6 Jersey Central
This show has a large amount of freight traffic. CNJ still has an interesting variety of power in the early 1970s. Electro-motive, Alco and Fairbanks – Morse. Road engines and switchers. Bits of foreign roads are seen.
Passenger service has enough commuters and the Monmouth trains. So, something for everyone.
Cinematography is from various sources. Well done overall. Soundtrack levels are balanced. Narrative is fair. Pronunciation is hard to sort out, at times.
Film has been nicely restored by JPM. Moves at a good pace. Nicely done with balanced audio.
Volume 6 is a solid entry in the series. Some map references would have been very helpful. Too bad, none are included. Still, if Jersey Central or early 1970s railroading gets interest. Bump it up for scarce pre-Conrail films. It does the job.
Rating: 4 1/2 Stars
American Train Video Reviews 