Blair County
A locomotive shops, not a freight yard
The North American Rail Network maintained by the Federal Railroad Administration and the Bureau of Transportation Statistics places the Samuel Rea Shops, operated by Norfolk Southern, 0.86 miles from the Census centre.
A shops is a different thing from a classification yard. What passes through it is locomotives and heavy components rather than commodities.
Four rail yards inside eight miles, which is a works town
Beyond it the concentration is unusual. The Juniata Shops sit 6.6 miles off, a yard 6.8 miles away at East Altoona and the Rose yard 7.6 miles out, so the same rail network data puts four rail yards within eight miles of this place.
That is the signature of a railway works town rather than a junction, and it shapes the road work around it. Heavy components, machined parts and shop supplies move by flatbed and by straight truck on short local runs, which is a different trade from hauling stone.
Limestone one side, soft coal the other, and one chromite plant
Beyond the shops the ground pays for itself in two directions. The Roaring Spring Quarry works limestone 6.3 miles off with 47 people, the largest quarry payroll within fifteen miles, and Grannas Brothers Stone and Asphalt 8.4 miles away at Williamsburg.
West of that it turns to bituminous coal in Cambria County: a mine 11.0 miles off at Cresson, a yard 11.8 miles away at Sankertown, a refuse site 12.0 miles out at Portage and a second Cresson working 12.2 miles off with 69 people on it.
And one operation is unlike anything else nearby: the Mine Safety and Health Administration lists a plant 12.3 miles away at Sproul working chromite. A readiness centre sits 2.2 miles off at Fort Fetter.
Flatbeds and day cabs for the shop traffic, dumps off the stone and the coal, rollbacks, box trucks, straight trucks, service bodies and pickups.
Shop work is awkward rather than heavy — long components, tight gates, a lot of reversing — while the runs out to the Roaring Spring Quarry 6.3 miles off and Cresson 12.2 miles away are ordinary loaded work. A truck from here has often done both.
- Common around the Juniata Shops and the Rose yard, and it makes no difference. We buy it the same way.
- The deck is scarred from chains and dunnage.Expected on component work out of a works town. Between the Juniata Shops 6.6 miles off and the Roaring Spring Quarry 6.3 miles away we see it constantly.
Swapping the work is easier than swapping the truck.
The rest is retirements and estates, from Fort Fetter 2.2 miles off out to Sproul 12.3 miles away.