The Jacksonville Terminal Subdivision is a group of

railroad Rail transport (also known as train transport) is a means of transport that transfers passengers and goods on wheeled vehicles running on rails, which are incorporated in tracks. In contrast to road transport, where the vehicles run on a pre ...

lines owned by

CSX Transportation CSX Transportation , known colloquially as simply CSX, is a Class I freight railroad operating in the Eastern United States and the Canadian provinces of Ontario and Quebec. The railroad operates approximately 21,000 route miles () of track. ...

in and around

Jacksonville Jacksonville is a city located on the Atlantic coast of northeast Florida, the most populous city proper in the state and is the List of United States cities by area, largest city by area in the contiguous United States as of 2020. It is the co ...

, which was historically a major railroad hub. The Jacksonville Terminal Subdivision includes about 13.0 miles of track.

Lines

A Line

The primary line through the Jacksonville Terminal Subdivision is the A Line, which is one of CSX's main lines in the eastern United States. Within the Jacksonville Terminal Subdivision, the A Line runs from Dinsmore south, passing Jackonville's Amtrak station, and through Grand Junction (historically known as Grand Crossing). Grand Junction is where it connects with the

Kingsland Subdivision The Kingsland Subdivision is a railroad line owned by CSX Transportation in Northeast Florida. The line begins in Jacksonville at a junction with the A Line near Moncrief Yard. From there, it heads east and then turns north near Panama Park. Fro ...

Norfolk Southern Railway The Norfolk Southern Railway is a Class I freight railroad in the United States formed in 1982 with the merger of Norfolk and Western Railway and Southern Railway. With headquarters in Atlanta, the company operates 19,420 route miles (31 ...

's Springfield Lead also crosses the A Line at Grand Junction.CSX Jacksonville Division Timetable
/ref> The A Line continues from Grand Junction south through Moncrief Yard to Beaver Street Interlocking. Here, the A Line connects with the S Line west to Baldwin, as well as the Florida East Coast Railway and Norfolk Southern's Valdosta District. From the interlocking, the A line continues southwest to St. Johns, where it continues as the

Sanford Subdivision The Sanford Subdivision is a railroad line owned by CSX Transportation in Florida. The line runs along CSX's A Line from St. Johns (near Jacksonville) south through Palatka to DeLand. At its north end it continues south from the Jacksonville ...

. All of

Amtrak The National Railroad Passenger Corporation, Trade name, doing business as Amtrak () , is the national Passenger train, passenger railroad company of the United States. It operates inter-city rail service in 46 of the 48 contiguous United Stat ...

's passenger services through Florida run on the A Line. The A Line was previously the main line of the

Atlantic Coast Line Railroad The Atlantic Coast Line Railroad was a United States Class I railroad formed in 1900, though predecessor railroads had used the ACL brand since 1871. In 1967 it merged with long-time rival Seaboard Air Line Railroad to form the Seaboard Coast L ...

S Line

The S Line currently runs east from Beaver Street Interlocking west to Baldwin. The S Line was previously the main line of the Seaboard Air Line Railroad. At Baldwin, the S Line continues south as the Wildwood Subdivision. It also connects with the Callahan Subdivision to the north and the Florida Gulf and Atlantic Railroad to the west at Baldwin. Despite being part of the S Line historically, the line's mileposts have the prefix SP.

Yards

Within the Jacksonville Terminal Subdivision, CSX operates two major yard facilities.

Moncrief Yard

Moncrief Yard is located on the A Line just north of Beaver Street Interlocking. It serves as CSX's primary

classification yard A classification yard (American and Canadian English ( Canadian National Railway use)), marshalling yard (British, Hong Kong, Indian, Australian, and Canadian English ( Canadian Pacific Railway use)) or shunting yard (Central Europe) is a railway ...

for the Jacksonville area. Moncrief Yard was previously the

's main yard in Jacksonville.

Duval Yard

Duval Yard, also known as Jax Ramp, is located just northwest central Jacksonville. Duval Yard serves as an

intermodal terminal Intermodal passenger transport, also called mixed-mode commuting, involves using two or more modes of transportation in a journey. Mixed-mode commuting is often used to combine the strengths (and offset the weaknesses) of various transportati ...

for Jacksonville. The yard and its connecting track were built in the late 1970s by the Seaboard Coast Line Railroad for that purpose since Moncrief Yard was becoming too overcrowded.

History

Railroad lines in Jacksonville were largely built at the end of the 1800s. CSX's A Line north of Jacksonville (which leads to the

Nahunta Subdivision The Nahunta Subdivision is a railroad line owned by CSX Transportation in Florida and Georgia. The line runs along CSX's A Line from Ogeechee, Georgia, to Dinsmore, Florida, for a total of . At its north end it continues south from the Savannah ...

) was originally part of the

East Florida Railway East or Orient is one of the four cardinal directions or points of the compass. It is the opposite direction from west and is the direction from which the Sun rises on the Earth. Etymology As in other languages, the word is formed from the f ...

. The A Line south of Jacksonville (which leads to the Sanford Subdivision) was part of the

Jacksonville, Tampa and Key West Railway The Jacksonville, Tampa and Key West Railway was a railroad and steamboat network in Florida, USA at the end of the 19th century. Most of its lines became part of the Plant System in 1899 and the Atlantic Coast Line Railroad in 1902. The line re ...

. Both lines became part of the

Plant System The Plant System named after its owner, Henry B. Plant, was a system of railroads and steamboats in the U.S. South, taken over by the Atlantic Coast Line Railroad in 1902. The original line of the system was the Savannah, Florida and Western R ...

and later the

. Grand Crossing was originally the junction between the East Florida Railway, the

Jacksonville and Southwestern Railroad The Jacksonville & Southwestern Railroad (J&SW) was a railroad that served Florida from 1899 to 1904. It was purchased by the Atlantic Coast Line Railroad in 1904. The Atlantic Coast Line would extend the line further west and it would become th ...

(now the Kingsland Subdivision), and the Atlantic, Valdosta and Western Railway (now Norfolk Southern). The S Line from Jacksonville west to Baldwin Junction was part of the

Florida Central and Peninsular Railroad The Florida Central and Peninsular Railroad was the final name of a system of railroads throughout Florida, becoming part of the Seaboard Air Line Railway in 1900. The system, including some of the first railroads in Florida, stretched from Jacks ...

, which became part of the

Seaboard Air Line Railroad The Seaboard Air Line Railroad , which styled itself "The Route of Courteous Service," was an American railroad which existed from April 14, 1900, until July 1, 1967, when it merged with the Atlantic Coast Line Railroad, its longtime rival, t ...

. The S Line previously continued east and north beyond Beaver Street Interlocking toward Panama Park prior to the 1990s. The former right of way of this segment is now the S-Line Urban Greenway. The remaining S Line north of Panama Park is now part of the

. The Seaboard Air Line never operated a yard within Jacksonville. Their main yard for the Jacksonville area was just west of Jacksonville in Baldwin. Baldwin Yard is still in service and is now located on the

Wildwood Subdivision The Wildwood Subdivision is a railroad line owned by CSX Transportation in Florida. It runs along CSX's S Line from Baldwin south to Zephyrhills via Ocala and Wildwood for a total of 155.7 miles. The S Line is CSX's designation for the line t ...

. With a large number of railroads operating in Jacksonville, the Jacksonville Terminal Company was chartered in 1894 to coordinate train movement of multiple railroads in the area, manage yards, and build Jacksonville Union Terminal, which opened in 1919. By 1902, the Jacksonville Terminal Company and the Union Terminal were jointly owned by five railroads. The

, and

Florida East Coast Railway The Florida East Coast Railway is a Class II railroad operating in the U.S. state of Florida, currently owned by Grupo México. Built primarily in the last quarter of the 19th century and the first decade of the 20th century, the FEC was a pr ...

each owned 25% of the company, and the Southern Railway and the

Georgia Southern and Florida Railway The Georgia Southern and Florida Railway , also known as the ''Suwanee River Route'' from its crossing of the Suwanee River, was founded in 1885 as the Georgia Southern and Florida ''Railroad'' and began operations between Macon, GA and Valdosta ...

each with 12.5% ownership. The Jacksonville Terminal Company ceased operations in 1976 when the Union Terminal closed and

opened its current

Jacksonville station Jacksonville station is an Amtrak train station in Jacksonville, Florida, United States. It serves the ''Silver Meteor'' and ''Silver Star (Amtrak train), Silver Star'' trains as well as Amtrak Thruway buses to Lakeland, Florida, Lakeland. The stat ...

on the

northside Northside or North Side may refer to: Music * Northside (band), a musical group from Manchester, England * NorthSide, an American record label * NorthSide Festival (Denmark), a music festival in Aarhus, Denmark * "Norf Norf", a 2015 song by Vinc ...

of town. An interlocking tower once stood at the north side of Beaver Street Interlocking. The tower was demolished in 1999 to accommodate the new wider Beaver Street (

US 90 U.S. Route 90 or U.S. Highway 90 (US 90) is an east–west major United States highway in the Southern United States. Despite the "0" in its route number, US 90 never was a full coast-to-coast route. With the exception of a short-lived ...

) overpass. The interlocking is now controlled by

Centralized traffic control Centralized traffic control (CTC) is a form of railway signalling that originated in North America. CTC consolidates train routing decisions that were previously carried out by local signal operators or the train crews themselves. The system con ...

signals controlled by dispatchers. In 1967, the

and

merged to form the

Seaboard Coast Line Railroad The Seaboard Coast Line Railroad was a Class I railroad company operating in the Southeastern United States beginning in 1967. Its passenger operations were taken over by Amtrak in 1971. Eventually, the railroad was merged with its affiliate lin ...

. In the late 1970s, the Seaboard Coast Line built Duval Yard and Intermodal Ramp and associated tracks on the northwest side of town. Duval was built to handle intermodal traffic, since the areas other yards were too overcrowded by then. Duval Yard is connected to the A Line on the north end and the S Line on the south end. Seaboard Coast Line became

in 1986 after merging with the

Chessie System Chessie System, Inc. was a holding company that owned the Chesapeake and Ohio Railway (C&O), the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad (B&O), the Western Maryland Railway (WM), and Baltimore and Ohio Chicago Terminal Railroad (B&OCT). Trains operated und ...

Norfolk Southern The Norfolk Southern Railway is a Railroad classes, Class I freight railroad in the United States formed in 1982 with the merger of Norfolk and Western Railway and Southern Railway (U.S.), Southern Railway. With headquarters in Atlanta, the ...

and the

have trackage rights on CSX to interchange with one another and with CSX at Moncrief Yard. CSX also has trackage rights on the Florida East Coast Railway into their Bowden Yard and on the Norfolk Southern into their Simpson Yard.

References

{{Reflist CSX Transportation lines Rail infrastructure in Florida