Baltimore's importance in railroad history is evidenced by the city's extensive network of active, and disused, track. This map includes in black only the more significant stretches of railroad. This tour page follows what began as the Locust Point Branch which is traced by a light magenta wash. We begin at Mt. Clare Junction at map left.

The 1840s-era Locust Point Branch peeled to the right from the main line at Mt. Clare Junction, pictured here, just northeast of the Carrollton Viaduct, then snaked its way generally east to the then-new waterfront facilities.

In this photo, B&O Museum engine Pere Marquette switcher 11 sits about a mile from the museum and watches a CSX freight roll past onto the LPB.

The Mile values are negative because they are relative to the current mileposts CSX employs for its Locust Point trackage, which are different from those B&O had used originally.

The prior photo was snapped near the top left corner of this aerial view where the LPB curves southeast to cut a diagonal route. Near top center, the Monroe Street bridge spans Mt. Clare Yard. At bottom right, the LPB crosses Washington Boulevard, which this tour page will similarly cross. A not-implemented 1961 highway plan had I-95 running left-right across the top half of this image.

At photo time, the LPB was still double tracked, plus near photo middle had a siding into the Montgomery Ward warehouse. An aerial photo from 1964 is a bit too blurry to be absolutely certain, but it appears both that siding and second LPB track were removed by then.

Here's the view looking southeast in the general direction of Locust Point with the Ward warehouse hidden on left by railcars. Even if that 1961 highway plan was rejected, Interstate 95 did find its way into the vicinity, as witnessed by the green road sign in the distance that is for elevated I-95's Russell Street exit.

Heading the freight of the prior photo is Locomotive Management Services engine 700 that pauses at Washington Boulevard for the OK to move ahead. Immediately behind the lead engine is a Union Pacific diesel, an uncommon sight this far east. The train stretches back past Mt. Clare Junction to the Carrollton Viaduct.

That's the former Montgomery Ward warehouse on the right, now Montgomery Park.

Link: 1999

The excess width here is shown old maps as Putnam Street, a rarely-used road that has never been paved. An 1894 topo map has the LPB double-tracked here, as it probably had been originally.

CSX 8644 is a model SD50 whose yellow digits reveal renumbering (from CR 6703). It received full CSX paint during 2005.

Primer gray "rent-a-wreck" unit GCFX 3079 has been around, also doing time as CITX 3079 and CEFX 3079.

Link: 1999

This public grade crossing is of note because it is Baltimore city's oldest active, I believe. The crossing spans busy Washington Boulevard, the main road to the nation's capital at the time the LPB tracks arrived during the 1840s. It continued as such until alternate roads opened after World War II, such as Southwestern Boulevard and the Harbor Tunnel Thruway.

In addition to the usual accoutrements, many city grade crossings were equipped with standard traffic signals. This photo captures the relatively brief period during which those signals had LED lamps. The signals were removed when the grade crossing hardware was upgraded during the 2010s.

The Arlington Avenue grade crossing on the west side of the B&O Museum is of more recent vintage.

Appropriately for an old grade crossing, an elderly signal guarded the crossing, but has retired since photo time. The pole and support design makes me wonder if a wig-wag style signal had been mounted here before the lights.

Links: Pic of Wig Wag at B&O Museum, Dan's Wig Wag Site

A more recent photo shows the grade crossing has received new signals for both trains and automobiles.

During its more than 160 years of heavy industrial use, the LPB has required similar equipment upgrades and refreshes all along its route, leaving the route itself the only original artifact to be found. There are no circa 1840 culverts, stone bridges or anything else from that time period extant to show the LPB is one of the oldest still-active railroad routes in the USA. Its importance in history of railroading and role in international trade has been somewhat overlooked.

The photographer has crossed Washington Boulevard. Into the 1960s, B&O had here maintained a small yard to serve local industry; more recently the rusty siding on the left has been pulled up. The distant overpass is that of Interstate 95.

The LPB's crossing of Washington Boulevard is at the upper-left corner as this tour proceeds to the east (right). Three rail routes meet near CX Tower, marked by the small box with an X inside: the LPB, the Camden Cutoff, and the South Baltimore Branch. Gwynns Falls flows along the bottom.

This topo map shows the LPB cutting through lowlands that had been mined for clay to make bricks. If I correctly recall a geology presentation, Central Maryland's clay layer was carried in by foehn winds around the time the Wisconsin Glaciation finished retreating some 11,000 years ago.

"ST" is for Putnam Street parallel to the LPB. Development southeast of there sprouted railcar sidings.

This map covers the same area as the prior two panels, and the next. It more clearly represents the various rail sidings in this area. Much of the street grid shown here was planned but never built.

Wicomico Street's trackage originally peeled from the LPB, then ran surrounded by cobblestones, as had been common for street trackage within the city. Wicomico Street is one of the few places such trackage, though disused, can still be seen in Baltimore, as at right. Cantilevered steel arms had reached out to railcars to assist with loading and unloading.

Same spot, 45 years later when freight rail service along this section of the LPB was near its peak. Later this decade, construction of I-95 would begin across the lower portion of the photo, and pave the way for more trucks.

During the Bicentennial year of 1976, ten lanes of I-95 were taking shape near Carroll Junction. From this angle, the roof of CX Tower is barely visible near photo center behind the Monroe Street bridge. This part of the LPB (right) had not yet been reduced to single track where it curves to join the main at the tower. Russell Street is at lower left.

"Aha, so that's the Locust Point Branch!" -- spoken by people who have seen this view while driving southwest from Baltimore on I-95. Now CSX deems these tracks part of its Mt. Clare Branch.

Near I-95 the LPB curves in from the left while the South Baltimore Industrial Track does so from the right.

The LPB was the first on this scene, joined the next decade by what is known as the Camden Cutoff, the multi-track, straighter route into downtown Baltimore that became the main line. The Cutoff also meant trains to/from Locust Point no longer needed to traverse the Carollton Viaduct.

Change for: Camden Cutoff tour at this site, or South Baltimore Branch tour

The spot where the three lines join is known as Carroll Junction. By 1860, the Camden Cutoff had blended with the LPB to become the main line between Baltimore and Washington, a role in which it continues today.

Casting the shadow at our feet is I-95. The yellow/green bridge visible carried Monroe Street over the tracks; the bridge was subsequently upgraded. Acting as a convenient landmark near the right edge is the "Baltimore" stack which can be seen readily from I-95 near the I-395 interchange.

CX Tower had stood adjacent the large, silver equipment box on the other side of the tracks.

Links (CX Tower): 1978, ~1980, board, levers

The photographer is looking back from near the CPL signal of the prior photo. The undeveloped, swampy land adjacent to Gwynns Falls, combines with winter pallor to create a barren landscape. Perhaps a few centuries from now, for better or worse, places on Mars will look like this.

Links: 1984 from tower, LPB curving on right, 1993

For many years there was a 1500 foot long stretch along which the tracks bottlenecked down to the two seen here, this despite the LPB joining from the right. The rest of the seven miles from the Thomas Viaduct to Camden Station had long been triple tracked.

What looks like an imminent collision in the distance at the Hollins Ferry Road grade crossing is merely an optical illusion since the train was not moving at photo time.

During 2019 CSX eliminated that short bottleneck, but it does mean trains coming off the LPB now need to switch tracks twice instead of once to get to the leftmost track that continues to Locust Point. CSX 6519 is using that weedy track for local delivery purposes.

This view northeastward shows the two switches a train bound for Locust Point need to negotiate. The prior photo and the next were shot from the Bush Street grade crossing, site of the distant ABC sign.

Link: ~2010

Back when CPL signals were still on duty, a crewman waits for the train to pass. At that time, he will throw a switch so it can back into the South Baltimore Industrial Track.

Links: D&H 7409 here 1991, 8527 became LSRC 6354

CSX 8527 has crossed Bush Street, and has a nice view of part of downtown Baltimore's skyline. That's the Bayard Street grade crossing a short distance away.

More recent views below, from left to right with models GP40-2, AC44CW, and GP40-3:

With the photographer standing near the green-painted building of the prior photo, this is the view back. These CPL signals have since been swapped out for in-line equivalents. The center CPL was noteworthy because it was the only known "complete" such signal: 8 lamps in the circular center plus 6 marker orbital lamps, for a total of 14, the maximum possible under the B&O system.

The grade crossing in the foreground is that of Bayard Street. Approaching trains bound for Locust Point must bend east (left) to the Ridgely Street grade crossing.