The Chesapeake &Amp; Ohio
A detailed, self-guided railfan tour
Introduction
There was never anything complicated or tricky about the Chesapeake & Ohio Railway. It gathered coal in the mining areas of West Virginia, and sent it in both directions: East to tidewater at Newport News, and west to the industrial heartland via Cincinnati. In many respects, it was similar to the Norfolk & Western. Indeed, both railroads rank among the most consistent money earners of all time. This tour will follow the entire C&O line westward from Tidewater all the way to Cincinnati. Notice that several segments are now complete, and are detailed in the segments section below.
As of January 2010, a total of just over 387 miles of railroad station list miles of the tour had been completed.
Other Tours
WHAT YOU WILL FIND HERE: From a particular starting point, each segment of this coverage will allow you to follow the instructions given, drive to a railfan site, then to the next, etc. etc. Traffic levels and patterns will be given, and the photographic/ lighting considerations for each site will usually be mentioned. You'll be told about Area Attractions, such as tourist and historic sites, as well as hotels and restaurants which are trackside or otherwise worthy of note. In short, you'll be able to plan an entire family or railfan-only outing or even a vacation from this guide, as it is completed in the months to come.
WHAT YOU WILL NOT FIND HERE: This is a railfan guide, not a photo collection. There are already many excellent and enjoyable railroad photo sites available, and one more really wouldn't add much value to the general railfan. Besides, photos take up a lot of memory, and your humble Webmaster has to pay for memory.
You will not find fancy graphics, as this is a tour guide, not an exhibition of HTML or graphics expertise. You'll be able to load these pages quickly and print them without waiting a week for each page to print. Also, you'll conserve toner in the process.
Contributors
Major contributors to this effort include:
John Hopkins -- Complete text for the Sandstone to Cotton Hill, West Virginia segment.
Loyd Lowry -- Complete text from Clifton Forge to north of Hinton at Sandstone.
Andy Wade -- Detail and inspiration, South Charleston - the eastern edge of Kenova.
Train Gifs. All train gifs used within this tour are from the Ed Bindler's train gifs site, which is here.
Peter Furnee, CSX logo
Tony Hill -- Webmaster and text/data for all areas not mentioned above. The guy who makes it go. Any use of the first person pronoun in any Frograil tour refers to Tony Hill unless specifically otherwise indicated.
If you'd like to contribute to this effort, please contact me at webmaster@frograil.com, and let me know what you'd like to do. We'll work together: You supply the data/info, and I'll do the HTML stuff and upload it. You'll get a chance to review the fruits of your efforts before the general public sees the finished product, so you can let me have your corrections, additions and changes.
Segments
- Newport News -- Richmond [Williamsburg - Richmond complete -- 45.4 miles]
- Richmond -- Lynchburg [Complete -- 85.0 miles]
- Lynchburg -- Clifton Forge[Complete -- 84.5 miles]
- Clifton Forge -- Hinton
- Clifton Forge (JD Cabin) - Lowmoor -- 3 miles
- Covington, VA - north of Hinton [Complete -- 57.2 miles]
- Hinton -- South Charleston
- New River Gorge [Complete -- 44.5 miles]
- Cabin Creek -- South Charleston [Complete -- 18.5 miles]
- South Charleston -- Ashland [Compete South Charleston - Eastern edge of Kenova -- 49.2 miles]
- Ashland -- Cincinnati [In the future]
Contact me here.