Last night I was looking at this set of photos on flickr of a magnificent signal bridge in Bloomington, IL. It had apparently been home-built by the Chicago & Alton.

Reading further about it, I learned it was scrapped only recently. How upsetting! In Los Angeles, the county art museum is spending ten million dollars to move a boulder (Read about it). But no one in Illinois wanted to spend ten thousand dollars to save this awesome piece of railroad sculpture. Darn!

Are any signal bridges being preserved at museums? Some of these bridges, like this Alton example, are really pretty spectacular.

The Railroaders Memorial Museum in Altoona managed to save at least one, in 2009:

http://cu.altoonamirror.com/galleries/304524/

However, the Conrail Historical Society site implies that it was later rejected due to damage:

http://thecrhs.org/preservationprojects ... ve-signals

I have a vague recollection that one was saved by the RR Museum of Pa. from the nearby Amtrak line, or was that just the cast-iron bridge?

There WAS one "preserved" (specifically saved by Andy Muller and erected for the heck of it as a photo prop) on the Blue Mountain & Reading's original right-of-way at "Glen," frequently photographed for its proximity to the adjacent highway, but who knows what its current status is.....

FLO -

For the record, these are two different things:

A signal bridge is a structure that is anchored at both ends to the ground.

A cantilever bridge is a structure that is anchored to the ground on one end, with the upper structure out over the track.

The Chicago & Alton structure in your photos is a cantilever. Both of these types have (had) signals over the various tracks that passed beneath the structure.

Les

FLO -

To expand the discussion a little bit. We had a guy at HVRM who was primarily interested in signals. He was instrumental in getting a number of different types of signals of historic significance, installed at our museum. All of them are operational from track circuits. He also told me that he had a contact that had agreed to give him a former Pennsy signal bridge with all of the remaining PRR color light signals intact. Unfortunately, he later left the museum, so that donation never happened. A shame, because I think that a functioning signal bridge would look great at our museum. I agree with you that signal bridges, and cantilevers for that matter, are an important part of rail preservation and should be saved.

Les Beckman (Hoosier Valley Railroad Museum/North Judson, Indiana)

Actually, I think the ARMM has theirs. The one we talk about on the photo page was a second one.

I believe the IRM has preserved signal bridges and signals as part of its working mainline.

James -

I know that IRM in Union has working semaphores and IC color light signals along their line, but I don't recall seeing a signal bridge. Maybe one of the guys from IRM can confirm that it is indeed in place.

Les

I do not think that IRM has either a signal bridge or cantilever signals on their demonstration railway, though I am unsure if any are in the collection.

At Johnson Siding, a passing siding, they have errected former Illinois Terminal overhead supports. These are steel latticework, mounted to wooden poles. They are from the IT's St. Louis subway approach trackage, but were mounted on concrete poles on the IT. With the wood poles, it looks like the South Shore's "Ideal Section."

The North Carolina Transportation Museum at Spencer received a grant from the North American Railway Foundation to install an interactive exhibit to demonstrate railroad signaling. According to the most recent issue of the NCTM Foundation's "Shop Talk" magazine, the display will include a Southern Railway "Brosnan" signal bridge.

Alan Maples

NCTM (i.e. the North Carolina Transportation Museum in Spencer, NC....not to be confused with the other NCTM {National Capital Trolley Museum}) already has a signal bridge installed:
http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.p ... 610&nseq=5

The Southern Appalachia Railway Museum has the cantilever from North Oakdale on the CNO&TP. It is stored on a flatcar but will hopefully be put on display at some point.

Noticed that Orange Empire Railway Museum (OERM) is working on a huge signal bridge:
http://gsee.sdf-us.org/signals/projects ... ridge.html

The Pacific Southwest Railway Museum in Campo (San Diego County) CA has a former AT&SF cantilever bridge is a structure that will be anchored to the ground on one end, with the upper structure out over the entrance road to the museum

Privately restored (and operable at one point) is the Blue Mountain & Reading's PRR position light single track bridge near Shoemakersville, PA. Whe they were running steam, it was arguably to most photographed signal in the country... pis the trains could really fly on the straightaway below it. Good times.

Rob