AquaTrack keeps Jersey 's
rails free of fall foliage
By Mike Frassinelli/The
Star-Ledger The Star-Ledger
(picture of train goes here)
Aqua Track clears leaves from NJ Transit rails
Every fall in
northern New Jersey ,
the autumn leaves wreak havoc on the NJ Transit lines. To keep trains running
on schedule, the AquaTrack rides the rails pumping 17 gallons of water per
minute directly onto the head of the rails at 20000 pound of pressure per
square inch. Covering about 80 miles per day the crew maintains the Morris
& Essex and Montclair-Boonton lines during the week and the Pascack Valley
They have a front-row seat to the changing panorama of New Jersey autumns.
From their perch, operators of NJ Transit’s
"AquaTrack" leaf train, which clears tracks of potentially slippery
foliage and oily residue that could lead to poor traction and train delays, get
a view straight out of a Crayola factory:
Leaves of apple red and goldfinch yellow and every hue in
between, mixed with sights like an errant soccer ball along the banks of the
tracks, a graffiti-covered rail bridge and an either fearless or crazy deer
crossing in front of the train.
Except this New
Jersey fall foliage tour is all business.
Many tourists plan their weekends around the best times and
spots to view the falling, changing leaves. But for operators of trains in
mid-Atlantic states, where deciduous trees are in heavy supply, leaves are an
annoyance.
"This is by far the worst rail condition you can have —
operating the train for the fall with the leaf season," said Darren
Donald, senior road foreman of engines in NJ Transit’s Hoboken Division, as he
hosted The Star-Ledger for a ride-along on the AquaTrack train. "Even more
than ice and snow. Ice and snow is easy, believe me. The fall, the leaves —
they’re our worst enemy out here."
That’s where AquaTrack, a high-pressure water spraying
system, comes in.
Pushed or pulled by a locomotive, the system takes water
from two tanker train cars and delivers 17 gallons per minute, sending H2O and
leaves flying down the tracks.
Operators refer to it as the "aqua train."
"With the aqua train operating, it allows us to
maintain on-time performance," Donald said during a run between the
Montclair State University Station and the Little Falls Station.
"With the leaves on the rail, the leaves break down
into what looks like a grease. The leaves crush under the wheels — and that
literally turns to what has the consistency of grease. Steel wheels on grease
don’t work very well, but this aqua train helps keep this under control, keeps
our rail system moving. It’s definitely been a great advantage for us."
AquaTrack runs from early October to around Thanksgiving,
mostly on the Morris and Essex and Montclair-Boonton lines, which stretch from Hudson County
to Warren County ,
with other appearances on the Pascack Valley and Main/Bergen County lines in Bergen and Passaic
counties. The mix of falling leaves and steep grades at Summit Hill and Glen Ridge
Before then, in the battle between the trains and tree
leaves, the tree leaves too often won.
"Basically, it’s like a pressure washer and it washes
the leaf residue off the heads of the rail," said Tom Carlo, a foreman.
"When the trains go over the leaves, they crush the leaves and make the
oil, and it makes the trains slip when they go to stop or when they try to
start from a stopped position."
Too much oil from the crushed leaves, and the train wheels
could spin in place.
On a crisp autumn day last week, Carlo was on the AquaTrack
train traveling 30 mph with fellow aquamen Ken Targonski, an operator, Carmen
Cordero, a mechanic, and Cosimo Roselli, a conductor. Manning the locomotive at
the other end was engineer William Carrington and assistant conductor Raymond
Brunert.
"I’ve been here for 25 years and this is the best thing
they ever had," Roselli said. "They used to use sanders and
scrubbers."
The spraying is quite the sight, with water flying
everywhere.
But the AquaTrack operators stop the spraying when they see
people on train platforms.
That doesn’t stop people on the platform from thinking they
will get soaked.
"The first thing you see is everyone going like
this," Carlo said, making the motion of people covering their face with a
coat.
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NJ Transit's "AquaTrack" clears leaves and their
slick residue off rails in Little Falls using high-pressure water from this
small nozzle just above the rail. John Munson/The Star-Ledger
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