Flint

FLINT 1983. Photo by Don Ross

  Flint was once the second largest automobile producing city in the nation. Much of the Flint auto industry is served out of Bristol and Torrey yards, as well as the handling of all through freight from Port Huron and Canada. General Motors requires a “just in time” delivery system in order to meet the production demands of the many GM plants serviced by the GTW. All together, these plants generate an enormous amount of traffic for the Grand Trunk.

  GTW’s old mainline through Flint is severed, but still serves several large plants. Switch jobs out of Bristol Yard facilitate the movement of products and material between the plants and the yard. 
  Ronald Jackson a member of the GTW Historical Society had posted several of the old car control zoning charts of the Flint area. These have been very helpful to me and utilized in conjunction with the GTW track chart (also available from the GTWHS) has made it much easier to piece together operations in and around Flint. 

  Below is the overall Flint Terminal Map. I will organize the page in accordance with this chart as a means of reference.

FLINT TERMINAL MAP. From 1973 GTW Car Control Manual. Provided by Ron Jackson of the GTWHS

ZONE A:

General Motors Truck and Bus Assembly Plant:  

Torrey Yard: 
  Torrey Yard is located along the south side of Interstate 69 on the east side of Interstate 75. This yard is used for marshaling traffic to keep up with the demands of the GM assembly plant. The main body has 9 tracks which are primarily used for holding frame loads, stamped panel loads (86ft Boxcars), and empty autoracks. The yard office was located on the north side of the mainline at the bend in West 12th Street / South Ballenger Highway. The vehicular entrance is still there however the yard office has been removed. In its place is a cellular tower. After the Torrey Yard office was removed, it was replaced by David Rd Tower which was located on the south side of the yard further in toward the plant.

  On the west end of the yard, is a 6-track auto loading facility that holds up to 30 autoracks. 



 The photo below shows most of Torrey Yard. Fisher Yard is where the string of boxcars are spotted. The location of the old Torrey Yard office was in the foreground where the vehicle turn around can be seen at the base of the cell tower. The new David Rd Tower was built further into the plant complex and can be seen just to the right of the telephone pole in front of the autorack loading facility.

TORREY YARD

TORREY YARD viewed from Ballenger Highway

GM Truck and Bus autorack loading facility

ZONE F:

  Fisher Yard as it was called by rail hands is a smaller 7 track storage yard that runs along the southwest end of the main body that is used for storing loaded 60ft Boxcars with parts to feed the Fisher Body Plant #2.

FISHER YARD in the center of photo. Photographer Unknown

ZONE T:

  The bulk of the switching for the GM plant occurred in Zone T.

ZONES N & S:

Bristol Yard:  
  Bristol Yard is located on the west side of Interstate 75. Bristol is comprised of two large classification areas designated as north and south yards.
  North Yard is adjacent to the mainline which is double track with two additional arrival and departure tracks. North Yard itself has a 17-track classification area.
  South Yard consisted of a larger 28 track classification area. Running down the center of the two was a single track appropriately named Center Track. This track was considered part of the north yard because it stemmed from the north yard throat. It is actually a remnant of the original mainline.
 Along the southeast corner of the yard were the car repair shops and engine service facilities.

Bristol North Yard (ZONE N):
  North Yard handled all outbound traffic as it was pulled from the automotive plants. Center Track was often utilized to build outbound trains before they were dropped on the setout tracks (N21 &N22 in the diagram below).

Bristol South Yard (ZONE S):
  South Yard handled all inbound traffic...

  

  The picture below is a view from Bristol Tower of South Yard looking east. Note the rerouted Bristol Road being worked on at the far right. This picture was probably taken in the mid to late 90's.

BRISTOL YARD looking east from the yard tower. Photographer unknown.

  The next picture is a similar view as the yard looked in 1983. Note the storage track on the far right which ran behind Bristol Tower. The track chart has this identified as a thoroughfare track, but I always remembered seeing old 40' boxcars stored on this track when I was young.

Bristol South Yard in 1983. Photo by Jack Smith

BRISTOL YARD TOWER 1984. Photographer Unknown

BRISTOL YARD TOWER. Photo by Dennis Clark

  Bishop Airport to the south of the yard underwent a large renovation and expansion in the late 90's and early 2000's which created some minor changes to the west end of Bristol Yard. Included in the renovation were an expansion of the main terminal building and aircraft aprons which called for a rerouting of Bristol Road. Where Bristol Rd had once run almost straight east and west, it now skirted the southern edge of the yard. As a result, Bristol Yard Tower was removed and replaced with a modernized yard office further west. Along with the old tower, a few storage tracks in the southwest corner of the yard were removed. Another significant change was the Bristol Rd crossing at the west end of the yard which had been a crossing at grade up to this point. The crossing was converted to an overpass to avoid airport traffic delays. By the end of 2005 the economy parking area on the north side of Bristol Rd was completed.

Car Shops and Engine Service Facility:
  Located at the east end of Bristol South Yard is the service facility that handles both locomotives and rail cars.

ZONE O:

GM Service and Parts Plant:
 This plant was serviced by the GTW along the old mainline enroute to Chevy in the hole. Otterburn Yard, which was an 8 track storage yard, ran along the back / north side of the plant and was used to spot auto parts boxcars to keep up with the demand of the plant. 

GM Service and Parts Plant

OTTERBURN YARD with GM Service and Parts Plant in the background.

Working the GM Parts Plant. Photo by Jonathon Leese

ZONE R:

Corunna Road Yard:
  Chevy in the hole demanded a great number of auto parts boxcars but was never intended to see 86ft Hi-cubes. Stephenson Road Yard, which was located along the southeast corner of the plant was used to stage inbound and outbound traffic. This yard was too small for the massive Hi-cubes however, so these were stored a few miles west upgrade at Corunna Road Yard. They were brought down to the plant as needed, and as soon as they were pulled from the plant, they were quickly pushed back up the hill to the Corunna Rd Yard. Corunna Rd Yard consisted of 10 body tracks and a team track. It was also co-located with the Central Grocery distribution terminal which was serviced by the GTW.

Photo downloaded from RR Picture Archives, Photographer Unknown

Photo downloaded from RR Picture Archives, Photographer Unknown

ZONE M:

Chevrolet Manufacturing Division, Flint – “Chevy in the hole”:   
  Selectively compressing this plant will be a challenge. Modeling the complex at 75 percent size will equate to a 40-foot-long peninsula. Although this is indeed large, I feel it will be sufficient to model a good portion of automobile traffic indicative of the GTW.  The research with this particular project has been enjoyable. There is an incredible amount of history in this complex.  I intend to represent traffic volume as it was in the 1970's.

ZONE E:

James Lumber Company, as seen from overhead imagery still shows a shadow of the spur track. This business is located on Fenton Rd just west of GM Truck and Bus.

S. Grand Traverse St and Thread Creek

  Thread Creek and S. Grand Traverse Street will be the first module section for Flint.  It is a high-side half whale belly module box featuring a 3-inch raised fill.  The 8-foot section will include a #10 right hand crossover, a bridge over Thread Creek, and a second bridge over S. Grand Traverse St. The section will have a standard template frontier on the east end and terminate with the track elevated on the fill at a proprietary front on the west end thus requiring at least one more section to make it a true module. 

East end in the foreground

Pocket cut for installing and servicing Blue Point switch machines

#10 crossover on east end

  By increasing the gauge of piano wire to .054, I was able to drop the Blue Point down using a 2-inch standoff mount.  This allows the mechanism linkage to be engaged much easier from below the deck.

2-inch standoff mount

The switch machine's throwbar can be easily reach from below the deck

   For this project I will be creating my own bridges over Thread Creek and S. Grand Traverse St. using components from two Walthers 70ft single track deck girder bridge kits, both PC board and wooden ties, and scratchbuilt abutments.

PC board bridge ties

S. Grand Traverse St. concrete deck girder bridge 

Thread Creek open deck girder bridge

  I began work on the abutment during a cold spell in North Carolina. The garage was too cold to work and heating it every day was just not practical. Abutments however could be worked on indoors. 

  I started by cutting a flat sheet of .060 styrene to the basic dimensions required for this particular set of abutments. I then drew the locations of all essential elements and started building out from there.

  Here I'd added .250 x .250 styrene for the upright columns, the bridge seat, and the remainder of the abutment body. The evenly measured increments between each piece gave me a base to start building up the 1-12 batter.

  I continued to add more styrene and the incremental stair-steps for the batter.

  The final doubled up layer of .060 styrene brought the abutment to its final form. This .120 thick final layer will allow for strength as well as depth for spalling and detail work. I added additional stair-stepped styrene to the upright columns as well. 

  After adding more column depth to the backside, I then sanded the front and sides smooth.

    After I had repeated the process for the second abutment, I did a small mockup using an Exact Rail girder bridge as a stand-in.

  I then build the wing walls using the same process of stacking.  The wing walls can be built flat and do not require built-in batter. They will be angled, offset, tilted and glued in place to match up with the batter of the abutments.

  Once all the wing walls were complete, I started to work on the surface detail. The two southern wing walls bear the brunt of the water damage as Thread Creek flow south to north in this location. The southeast wing wall and eastern abutment both sustain direct impact of flood water damage. I believe it is for this reason that the railroad decided to put in a dam under the bridge in an effort to deflect and redirect water flow in order to mitigate this occurrence.

 The southern wing walls have been resurfaced at some point, perhaps more than once. The resurface material has cracked along most of the original underlying concrete. For these cracks, I first drew straight lines with a pencil and ruler, and then hand traced the path with my Exacto knife. I also outlined the areas that would be spalled using the Dremel tool.

  Once the pitting and spalling were complete, I sanded the surface again. The grooved styrene is still present at this point, but the prominent edges formed by the cutting are eliminated. They will show later when washes are applied over the area. I then test fitted the wing wall against the abutment and marked the areas where the spalling runs over onto the abutment face.

  For the two abutments and both of the north wing walls, I glued strips of HO scale 1x6, .010x.060, and scale 1x12 to the face to replicate the pour lines created by the concrete forms.

  I then sanded them to mostly smooth, leaving a very thin shadow of the board pattern. This came out very close to the look I was going for. I wanted to present a random pattern. I think that the painting and weathering process will get me to the final look I am trying to achieve.

  I then created the surface detail for the southeast wing and repeated the process previously discussed.

  It was then sanded, test fitted and glued to the abutment. Like before, corresponding surface detail was added to the abutment face. Then the remaining wing walls were glued on.

  Here are the final products ready for primer paint and then weathering.

East abutment

West abutment

Michigan Lumber Company, located along Clifford Street just east of the old Flint station and I-475, had two spur tracks entering through a gate on the east end of the facility.

2015, LOOKING EAST at Michigan Lumber Co with I-475 along the bottom of photo

Fenton Road:
  The very noteworthy "Grand Funk" bridge over Fenton Road, made famous by the namesake 70's rock band from Flint, MI. At some point in the early 80's the Grand Trunk bridge was vandalized to show the name of the band. Mark Farner and Don Brewer were two of the founding members, however Dennis Bellinger did not join the band until 1981 replacing Mel Schacher on bass.

Dort Highway:
  The Dort Highway bridge has an interesting art deco design...

Flint Amtrak:

C&O Crossing:
  Just east of Flint Amtrak, the GTW crosses the Chessie (now CSX) double track main.

C&O CROSSING looking west from Court Street

ZONE V:

Belsay Yard:
  This was one of the original yards in Flint which served the automotive industry.

ZONE C:

AC Spark Plug:

Looking west

Looking east

AC SPARK PLUG viewed from Robert T Longway Blvd

ZONE D:

C&O crossing just west of AC Spark Plug

James Lumber:

 Just to the west of AC Spark Plug, immediately after the crossing of the double track C&O is James Lumber. This is a simple industry that consists of a single spur track for the spotting of forest products cars near the storage facility.

Old road bed along the north side of James Lumber

JAMES LUMBER viewed from Robert T Longway Blvd on south side.

MODELING FLINT:

BRISTOL YARD TOWER:

  I was able to get a copy of the elevation blueprints from the GTW Historical Society for the Bristol Yard Tower. Since I knew I would be building this structure full scale, I bypassed the cardboard mockup and moved ahead with the styrene core of the building. 


BRISTOL CAR REPAIR SHOP:

   The Car Repair Shop, located in the service facility area at the east end of Bristol Yard is a sizable structure. The main building, which was added in the early 1970's, is 70 feet wide and 220 feet long. The inner work area consists of two tracks each with 11 different 20-foot work bays (total of 22 work bays). This large steel structure is attached to the side of the old pre-existing repair shop building that is located along the south side.