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I did find by chance an interesting area downtown Orland. It is the blocks north of Silver Meteor Drive. In two blocks are three tracks running parallel between "shoe box buildings" with a lot of load and unloading docks. The tracks extend more to the left (west) with more industry.

Do we have someone from Orlando in the forum who might comment on the kind of industry and may be add some detail photos?

Google Link
http://maps.google.de/maps?hl=de&ie=UTF8...6&t=h&z=18

Bing Link
http://www.bing.com/maps/?v=2&cp=28.5830...l=17&sty=h

A screen shot of a small sample with bing birds view.
[Image: orlando.jpg]
Searching google for Hazelhurst Avenue, Orlando, and entering one of the street addresses found (2224 Hazelhurst Avenue) in Bing, it appears that the building below Hazelhurst avenue, on the right of the tracks, is a company called Xpdx, a distributor of paper products (http://xpedx.com/).

Haven't checked out the others :-)

Smile,
Stein
steinjr Wrote:...a distributor of paper products...
That's good news. That kind and similar industry are a good reason for all kind of generic boxcars (and the special paper boxcars). I was astound to find such a dense area still existing in the 21. century with all the track still in operation. It is a good reason/example if you put industry buildings so close together on a US layout with modern equipment.
Did you see the same layout with three tracks is one block west too.
faraway Wrote:
steinjr Wrote:...a distributor of paper products...
That's good news. That kind and similar industry are a good reason for all kind of generic boxcars (and the special paper boxcars). I was astound to find such a dense area still existing in the 21. century with all the track still in operation. It is a good reason/example if you put industry buildings so close together on a US layout with modern equipment.
Did you see the same layout with three tracks is one block west too.

Yes, I scrolled around a bit and looked at street names, tracks etc.

Interesting area. The neighborhood industry support yard seems to be a little bit to the SE, near Guernsey Street. A couple of rail served industries just off the west end of W Yale Street - quite a few other streets named for universities in that neighborhood, btw - Yale, Princeton, Harvard, Bryn Mawr, Vassar, Tulane.

Small industry branch off to the west along Industrial Way - with three sub-branches going southwards between industries.

And then the branch you mentioned branching off west just north of Silver Star Road, up towards Silver Meteor Drive, with the two small sub-branches northwards.

But wait - there is more! :-)

If you continue a little further west (across John Young Parkway) there is an interesting track configuration where you have a diamond crossing to get into one industry where the angle is too severe for a regular spur.

Smile,
Stein
steinjr Wrote:Interesting area. The neighborhood industry support yard seems to be a little bit to the SE, near Guernsey Street. A couple of rail served industries just off the west end of W Yale Street - quite a few other streets named for universities in that neighborhood, btw - Yale, Princeton, Harvard, Bryn Mawr, Vassar, Tulane.

And then the branch you mentioned branching off west just north of Silver Star Road, up towards Silver Meteor Drive, with the two small sub-branches northwards.

And for those who don't remember, the Silver Meteor and Silver Star (along with the Silver Comet and the Gulf Wind) were streamliners on the Seaboard Air Line.

Wayne
Guys,I been using Bing and Google maps researching my N Scale ISL which will more then likely be CSX...I find these maps a priceless research tool.
Howdy! I've been lurking for a while and this thread is as good a point to jump in as any. I've been researching FCEN for several months now. I love this road because of the variety in motive power it's seen over the past decade—everything from doodlebugs and Baldwin 2-6-2s to "cutting edge" CF7s and GP18s... Not so many flamingo-pink fruit packers as Miami boasts, perhaps... Wink

I've spent most of my time on the Northbound and Southbound branches closer to my home and daily commute thus far, but I'm starting to dip my toes into the Silver Star industrial park area. If there's still interest, I'll be happy to take requests. I respect fences and No Tresspassing signs, but I'll do my best within those limits; some of those sidings between long buildings are not at all accessible.

Here's a shot I took today at the now-closed Appliance Direct facility on Ace just off 441. I just dropped by on the way home from work; the light wasn't really right to shoot here. I'll have to come back on a morning. These cars don't belong here (the cars in the Bing photo might have when it was taken); FCEN leaves loose cars parked all over the place; I never know if I'm looking at a team track or a storage spur. I'll find out where they live soon enough!
[Image: appliancedirect01.jpg]

[Image: appliancedirect02.jpg]

Here's a shot of the Orlando Coca Cola bottling plant on Seaboard road just off Silver Star Road.
[Image: cola01.jpg]

Oh, and here's an industry that comes with vintage Milwaukee boxcars and a Missouri Pacific caboose! It's Tool World out of Eustis. Makes paints.
[Image: toolworld01.jpg]

Great community, and I look forward to sharing and learning.
Welcome to Big blue and congrats for your first post. I for one would love to see more photos such as what you have posted. There is plenty of good stuff in those photos to use as inspiration for modeling. For example, the empty track in the third photo is perfect for a spur.

So again... WELCOME! And let's see more photos! Thumbsup
Thanks, Gary; your modeling is very inspiring. Great storm drains!

Sadly, that siding is the main line of the Northbound branch. It once bore U.S. presidents and Chicago gangsters, but it's rather sad these days. There is talk and political wrangling at present about upgrading it to link Eustis and Tavares into the nascent Orlando commuter rail service, but we'll see.

Okay, two more for tonight; your recent bridge project brought it to mind. This is the Dora Canal bridge just outside Tavares. Until this was built a century or so ago the entire region was serviced by barges working the area lakes linked by canals like this one. The railroad threw this bridge up (or its ancestor) virtually overnight, trapping a number of barges on the lake—as well as the HQ of one of the main barge shippers!
[Image: doracanal01.jpg]

The bridge itself is nothing special, but check out the other side (I'm not on the RR bridge, but a regular one, see below—the RR bridge is straight ahead but blocked by the trees). This scene is so central Florida. I'd like to use it in my layout design if possible to separate the urban industrial settings nearer Orlando from the more rural ones like Tool World. I would aim to use trees much larger than the norm to create shade over the water. And spanish moss! Somehow.
[Image: doracanal02.jpg]
A lovely concrete 1950s bridge! As a model, it would conceal the backdrop transition.
[Image: doracanal03.jpg]
Love the trees overhanging the canal, and all the spanish moss. Sort of reminds me of the swamps in East Texas and Western Louisiana with cypress trees and moss. Makes me wanna go fishin'!

Great story about the railroad putting in the bridge and blocking the canal! Guess that was in simpler times, eh?

Also, that track under discussion is the main? Again, better times in the past. Looks like very light rail.
This thread is making me a little :cry: ...homesick...

I spent my boyhood years from age 5 through 18 in Ocala, then college in Deland, with trips all over the state during that time but mostly in central FL. There are many modelgenic places down there. If I weren't so committed to '20s and '30's railroading in the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia, central Florida in the 1980's would be high on my list of modeling subjects. SoCal industrial areas would be another. Oh well. Maybe the next layout...

I remember one day driving through town, following a tank car down the street in Ocala. Nice street running in a small towl with neat brick buildings. Those Red & Black CF7's in Florida Central or Florida Northern livery are nice.

I'll try to lend a hand with memories or ideas if necessary.

Galen
Gary: Yep, that's the main. It doesn't carry much anymore since the Golden Gem OJ factory in Umatilla went south along with the groves. The most notable customer on the Tavares-Eustis branch aside from Tool World is the tourist excursion line that changes its name every year or so. At present it runs a GP10 (8330) and an EMD NW2 switcher in MILW livery. It pulls an interesting collection of vintage passenger cars, including a dome car built in 1948 for the California Zephyr.
[Image: gp10.jpg]

Galen, this one's for you. FCEN's HQ and service yard are to the right of the photo, where the big OJ factory used to be. Would love to hear your recollections as well. I grew up in Lake County in the 1970s when the rail activities in the Golden Triangle were more active, but I was away from Florida for 25 years. I wish I had been taking photos back then!
[Image: plymouth.jpg]

I'll start another thread after this to cover general Central Florida and let this one get back to covering the industrial parks... Wink
faraway Wrote:I did find by chance an interesting area downtown Orland. It is the blocks north of Silver Meteor Drive. In two blocks are three tracks running parallel between "shoe box buildings" with a lot of load and unloading docks. The tracks extend more to the left (west) with more industry.

Do we have someone from Orlando in the forum who might comment on the kind of industry and may be add some detail photos?

Google Link
http://maps.google.de/maps?hl=de&ie=UTF8...6&t=h&z=18

This is the result of an initial drive-through to get a better lay of the land. As you can see the photo selections are a bit random, but this is a good start. Hope it helps!

Here's the map the photos are keyed to (click to embiggen):
[Image: penningtonshaderrdaxis.th.jpg]

And here are the photos:

01) I liked what Lance Mindheim did with a similar industry on his layout ("February 6, 2010: Pallet Trucks", here: <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.lancemindheim.com/progress_photos.htm">http://www.lancemindheim.com/progress_photos.htm</a><!-- m -->), so I bagged it for future use.
[Image: 42110653.jpg]

02)
[Image: 48511961.jpg]

03) You'll notice a bit of garbage and a lot of weeds, but these sidings aren't too trashy. Either this industrial park is a bit off the beaten path for the nighttime crowd, or owners clean up their areas regularly.
[Image: 79520419.jpg]

04)
[Image: 98094569.jpg]

05)
[Image: 26337635.jpg]

06) Quite a contrast between this photo and the next; taken from the same spot!
[Image: 74639367.jpg]

07)
[Image: 95335075.jpg]

08)
[Image: 59653491.jpg]

09)
[Image: 55028257.jpg]

10) Just beyond the bend in the distance is the site for the Appliance Direct photo I posted above.
[Image: 89728734.jpg]

11)
[Image: 67734111.jpg]

12)
[Image: 44761517.jpg]

13)
[Image: 49298891.jpg]
Great photos! Please keep posting stuff like this when you can!
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