Site with several photos of an industrial switching operation in St. Louis, MO which utilizes part of the Illinois Terminal high line to access the printing plant of the St. Louis Post Dispatch. Such a trip would include traversing part of the old subway which the IT used to access the downtown St. Louis terminal. I believe (but could be wrong) that the IT terminal survives as the old St. Louis Globe-Democrat building. The last time I saw the building, it was being used as a parking garage. http://skipg.homeip.net/gallery/RSSM-Rail-Switching-Services-of-Missouri/RSSM_3051

Thanks for posting the link, very interesting. I visited St. Louis most recently in 2003 for the excellent ARM Convention at the Museum of Transport. Hard to believe that so much of the IT still exists- the terminal building you asked about is alive and well, now the "Globe Building". When we were there in 2003 it appears they were still receiving carloads of paper via the subway. Regarding your recollection about the building being a parking garage- you may be thinking of the former Pacific Electric building in Los Angeles, in which the main waiting room is now a parking garage. In general, the amount of dormant industrial infrastructure in St. Louis is truly amazing. Not that this is limited to St. Louis, but I really was struck by all of the empty facilities and "abandoned in place" rail facilities. The link below has a pic of the IT terminal building in 2003, along with a couple of other goodies from that trip. [url]http://www.railwaypreservation.com/illinois_terminal.htm[url][/url]

I go to law school in St. Louis, and like you, have been amazed at the industrial remains still present in the city. The former IT McKinley bridge will be open to road traffic again soon, after being closed for repairs for the past several years. The city of Venice, Illinois owns the bridge, and I believe work was starting on the structure when I left St. Louis for the summer. The former St. Louis Public Service power house on Delmar Ave still exists, as does the old carbard, now converted to bus use. I cross Grand Blvd every day on my way to class, and the street is sunk where the streetcar tracks are still imbeded in the roadway. All in all, still a neat place to see the past.