IT's TEAM TRACK TUESDAY - Share photos of action ( or inaction ) on your railroad's team track (s) here!
Team tracks are a vital part of day to day real railroad operations. Found in remote rural areas, small towns, and large cities team tracks handle a variety of freight cars, passenger head end cars, and MOW equipment. Another way to think of a team track is perhaps in terms of a utility track because practically every kind of freight car can be on/off loaded on a team track. Team tracks serve any industry or business, large or small, that may not have direct access ( no spur ) to the railroad.... such as a spur that services only an oil dealer or grain silo. Ie: Perhaps the local news paper orders its newsprint paper from a paper mill many states away.... the newspaper has no spur lead off the railroad and is located several miles away from any railroad tracks .... the newsprint is shipped to the newspaper by boxcar and the boxcar is spotted on a nearby team track and unloaded .... the newsprint is then trucked a short distance to the newspaper's printing plant.
This week on the Free State Junction Railway's team track 3 located in lower Patsburg, there is a boxcar loaded with large gears. The gears are headed for the Tucker Automobile plant, located in greater Patsburg, which is undergoing expansion. ( Seems like those Tucker Torpedos are selling like hot cakes! ) All tracks at the TA plant are full and there was no place to unload these heavy gears on the plant's property. Once these gears are off loaded they will be trucked several miles to the plant where they will be installed in the new sheet metal facility.
At first Dewey Carlson, the fill in team track foreman, ordered a small fork lift to do the heavy lifting only to find that he sent a kid to do a man's job. Unloading crews had to wait until Dewey placed a call to the FJSR MOW Dept. requesting a large wheel loader to do the heavy lifting. Once the wheel loader arrived the unloading began. The crew sure will be happy when Cliff, the regular team track foreman comes back from vacation. Cliff always gets it right the first time!
Go ahead and post your railroad's team track action. We'd love to see what's happening on your road's team track!
Have a fun and creative week! See ya next week on the team track! 
