A couple comments in response to comments made by others in this chain. My time reference is the 1970s.
I sure hope the sight of a rear end crew change with the outbound guys boarding the front end of the waycar was an exception. There was a high probability of ending up under the waycar when trying to board the front end. Standard practice was for the inbound crew to swing off the rear platform some distance before where the outbound guys were standing so they could then swing onto the rear platform.
Foreign road hacks accumulated at Clyde on a daily basis. There would be a literal rainbow of colors parked on the ice house tracks. I don’t recall the story of a yardmaster deliberately blocking a foreign transfer crew from getting back to their hack but I could see if they had a reputation for tieing things up where a yardmaster might return the favor.
The problem with transfers was the very nature of the beast. As a transfer crew your dragging around a lengthy train on a foreign railroad. You’re going to be the last thing moved. All home road moves will go in front of you. It was a daily, constant scene of westbound foreign road transfers backed up on mains 4 and 5 between Union Ave and the Belt bridge. They would literally be parked nose to tail. There might even be a train or two setting down on the Panhandle waiting it’s turn. With 16 hours to work it would be more likely to make this slow, sluggish trip and then get back home caboose light. But with the reduction to 14 and then 12 hours it became much more unlikely to make a round trip under the hours of service.
But this did not necessarily discourage the crews. They would simply contact their mgmt for a cab ride back to their terminal. While waiting there was always the ongoing pocker games in the “D” yard office locker room. Recently departed yardmaster “Twiggy” like to tell the story of having 4-6 card games going on in the locker room. I stopped in once or twice in the way back to the roundhouse with road power and did indeed see a host of characters playing cards. By the way, the crews were still being,paid until they got back to their terminal. Don’t forget back then “tow in time” did not count against the hours of service. Isn’t there a recent book with that title ?
The stranded foreign power would accumulate on the sidetracks behind”D” yard office or at the roundhouse.
I’m sure the same thing was happening to BN crews at foreign yards. It would be interesting to hear from someone with knowledge of how all this accumulated foreign stuff made its way back home.
Leo Phillipp
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