Train no. 405

NG503067

Train no. 405

Steam Passenger Train

In the vicinity of West 22nd Street, the 5266 on no. 405 gathers speed on the tangent which extends up to 60th Street. Actually, there is no 22nd Street out here; the train is running through the fields of the farm colony of the Indiana Central Hospital. Over this double-track line - generally the lightest-trafficked of the four entering Indianapolis - there are four passenger trains each way, three regular freight runs to and from Kankakee, and from none to four Shefi or Sheldon turns, depending on the amount of coal moving to the U. S. Steel Company at Gary. When the latter is running heavy, this line becomes a fairly good tonnage-mover and money-maker, but the coal traffic is sporadic and when it falls off, the amount of business handled drops to a trickle. The local freight runs once a day and has relatively little work except during the grain season. As for the traffic density of the other three main lines, the Indiana Division between Indianapolis and Cincinnati has the same passenger trains and usually one more through freight run (most of this additional business goes to the Illinois Division at Indianapolis). The Ohio and Illinois Divisions are much healthier from a traffic standpoint; both divisions operate an average of seven freight trains each way. The Ohio Division, with six passenger trains to the Illinois Division's five, probably has the heaviest density of any of the four lines.

Jeremy Taylor

Jeremy Taylor

2-1/4x3-1/4 neg

Feb-54

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463

J-1c

#5266

Alco-Schen

Speedway, Indianapolis, IN

See NG503067a