| The southward Shore Line Branch local heads into the morning sun at Little Bayou Castine in Mandeville. The train only had four cars -- empty Southern Railway insulated box cars 585230 and 585063 and loaded GM&O pulpwood cars 3536 and 4493 -- as the use of a caboose had been discontunued about a year earlier, in August or September of 1984. Bridge NA53.09 was a 256-foot ballasted deck trestle built in 1916.After five and a half years of documenting the Shore Line District, this was to be the last photo I ever took of a train on the branch. In fact, it was the last time I ever saw a train on the branch. We had sold our home in Mandeville, and the next day we moved back to New Orleans. The last train operated over the line on 16 January 1991, and most of the line was officially abandoned in June 1992; but the right-of-way survives as the TAMMANY TRACE rail-trail. |