The fourteen mile long Manor Branch is one of the more recently constructed lines on the MGA Mine District, having been built in 1984. Named after the reality company which purchased its right of way, the Manor line is actually owned by Consol Energy, although maintenance is contracted to the railroad. From its connection with the Mon Line at Block Limit Station "MAN" / CP85 at Manor Junction, the Manor Branch heads geographically northwest towards Sycamore, PA, roughly following the old Waynesburg and Washington RR's right of way. In the summer of 1999 a new section of double track was opened between MP M1.9 (CP1) and MP M3.4 (CP3) near Sycamore.
CTC signalling was extended from Manor Jct to the south end of the siding, allowing the dispatcher greater flexibility for meets. The remaining ten miles to the mine remained controlled by verbal MGA block clearance orders. At MP M5, the Manor Branch swings away from Browns Creek and heads northeast up the Patterson Creek Valley on a southbound grade that reaches 1.39% in locations until the large summit cut near M11. The railroad then drops downhill from the summit on a grade ranging around one percent to the Bailey Mine loading loop near milepost M14. BLS "FORK" at M11.5 is the location of the switch for the double track extension to the shared Bailey - Enlow Fork Mines' loadout. This extension and the recent installation of crossovers at MP M13 allows 230 cars to be parked between old "BAIL" (MP M13.7) - the beginning of the loading loop and "FORK". Empty trains are usually held on Enlow Siding to the south of "FORK" until the turn's scheduled loading time.
The loadout at Bailey can usually flood load a coal train in approximately two to three hours depending on train length. Prior to the construction of Enlow Siding in the early 1990s, the entire Manor Branch was a single track resulting in only one train being able to load every six hours. The combined coal from Consol's Bailey and Dupont Energy's Enlow Fork mines can be loaded in upwards of 6-10 trains a day, providing much of the total MGA coal tonnage for CSX and NS. This constant loading is due to a lack of storage place for the enormous amounts of coal this mine can produce, resulting in trains having to load continuously to avoid backing up and idling the coal retrieval process deep underground. Helpers are a necessity for northbound loaded trains out of Bailey - Enlow Fork, which usually shove from the set of crossovers at old BAIL to the summit at MP11 and then help brake the heavily loaded trains down the steepest portion of the grade to around MP8, where the helper is then uncoupled and returned to the mine for another northbound drag.
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Photo by Matt Reese. A southbound N24 Bailey Turn crossing Ten Mile Run catches the last rays of sunlight at Manor Junction, while the Emerald Mine's conveyors loom in the background.
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Photo by Chris Strogen. Two CSX SD70MACs lead a mty train south just outside of Waynesburg. Until the summer of 2001 when additional AC4400CWs arrived, many CSX turns used SD70MACs as power.
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Photo by Matt Reese. In an opposite view from the above, two SD80MACs pull 130 loads over State Route 18 at MP M0.3 near Waynesburg approaching Manor Junction. Milepost numbers on the Manor Branch carry an M prefix left over from the Monongahela days, which allowed dispatchers to differiate between the mileposts on the various branches.
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Photo by Matt Reese. Three of Norfolk Southern's high hood SD40-2s lead an empty train southward near Sycamore. The CP-3 cantilever can barely be seen above the units in the background.
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Photo by Matt Reese. Norfolk Southern #7209 has the point of a N23 Bailey Turn as it drifts downhill at the "FARM" defect detector on a clear February afternoon.
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Photo by Matt Reese. CW40-9 #9130 and a C-39 lead 103 loaded GEAX hoppers north through the cut at MP M5.
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Photo by Chris Strogen.
A Bailey Turn is approaching the road crossing at MP M6.7 on April 30th, 1999.
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Photo by Rich Borkowski Jr. Two Conrail locomotives are drifting downgrade with more than eighty loads of coal near MP M5 as the train leaves the Patterson Creek valley and swings into the Brown Creek valley below.
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Photo by Matt Reese. NS southbound at MP M10.
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Photo by Rich Borkowski Jr. Four of the Monongahela's Super-7s are adding their braking power to a northbound loaded train as it descends from the summit on April 22, 1997. .
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Photo by Matt Reese.The Bailey Helpers made up of two SD80MACs are returning lite at the Summit Track, led by Norfolk Southern #7200.
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A northbound train consisting of loaded Somerset Railroad hoppers is just short of the summit at MP M11. The power on the head end is an interesting lashup of advanced Conrail power (for the time period) consisting of two SD60Ms and a MGA Super 7, the best of both worlds. Photo by Bill Sechler - Matt Reese Collection
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Photo by Matt Reese. Almost a decade later, an N29 Alicia Turn is captured leading its 105 car train north at the exact same location. The Super 7s are long gone, replaced by the more mundane Norfolk Southern units.
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Photo by Rich Borkowski Jr. Two new Conrail SD70s lead a loaded mine turn north to the summit near MP M11 as seen from "Power Line Hill".
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Photo by Rich Borkowski Jr. Three Super 7s making up the Bailey Helper are heading north as the sun glints off the loaded hoppers near Time on April 30, 1999.
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Photo by Rich Borkowski Jr. A southbound PPLX drag is heading downgrade from the summit cut towards the (pre 1998) south end of Enlow Siding on Feb 17th, 1997.
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Photo by Matt Reese. Two SD80MACs roll north from the Bailey Mine approaching BLS "FORK". The track to the left of the train is Enlow Siding, used to store mty trains until their scheduled loading.
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Two Super 7s making up the Bailey Helper are on the point of this Conrail coal train as it loads on April 16th, 1991. The prep plant at Bailey Mine can be seen in the background in this view taken near BLS "BAIL".
Photo by Roger Durfee - Matt Reese Collection
The Defect Detector at "FARM" on the Manor Branch.
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