Valrico Subdivision

CSX Transportation's Valrico Subdivision is a railroad line in Central Florida. It serves as CSX's main route through a region of Central Florida known as the Bone Valley, which contains the largest known deposits of phosphate in the United States.[1]

Valrico Subdivision
CSX S Line (Yeoman Subdivision) SZ 0.0 Valrico SZ 5.2 Durant fmr. Florida West Shore Ry. (SAL) ← to Sarasota · to Turkey Creek → SZ 11.8 Welcome CSX Plant City Subdivision SV 835.8 Edison CSX Brewster Subdivision SV 837.7 Nichols SV 841.3 IMC Mulberry Yard CSX Bone Valley Subdivision SV 842.8 Mulberry CSX Achan Subdivision SV 845.4 Ridgewood SR 60 SV 850.1 Bartow fmr. South Florida Railroad (ACL) to Lakeland fmr. South Florida Railroad (ACL) to Lake Alfred US 17 / US 98 SV SVE 851.1 Pembroke Junction SVE 857.3 AX 870.8 Homeland AX 875.0 Fort Meade AX 879.4 Tencor AX 882.7 Bowling Green fmr. Florida Southern Ry. (ACL) to Arcadia SV 853.1 Connors (abandoned) SV 855.4 Lake Garfield (abandoned) SV 858.6 Alturas (abandoned) SV 863.5 West Lake Wales (abandoned) CSX Auburndale Subdivision Florida Midland Railroad
Note: Not to scale

The Valrico Subdivision runs from a junction with CSX's S Line in Valrico east to Mulberry and Bartow before turning south to Fort Meade and Bowling Green for a total of 47 miles.[2]

Much of the Valrico Subdivision dates back to the early 1900s and was originally operated under the same name by the Seaboard Air Line Railroad, a CSX predecessor.[3] Though track to Bowling Green was previously operated by the Atlantic Coast Line Railroad, another CSX predecessor.[4]

Operation

The Valrico Subdivision is currently CSX's busiest rail line thorough Bone Valley and carries large amounts of phosphate traffic, its main commodity. The line is mostly dispatched by Track Warrant Control, though there is a small Centralized Traffic Control signal system around Mulberry between IMC and Ridgewood.[2]

History

The 47 miles of track that are today the Valrico Subdivision were built incrementally from the late 1800s and early 20th century as the phosphate industry in Bone Valley began expanding.

Valrico to Bartow and Homeland

Crossing of the Valrico and Bone Valley Subdivisions in Mulberry. Diamond is located in the median of State Road 37.

The Seaboard Air Line Railroad built the segment of the line from Welcome to Nichols around 1905. It was built as an extension of the Plant City, Arcadia, and Gulf Railroad (which is today CSX's Plant City Subdivision), which Seaboard had bought earlier that year. Seaboard extended the line east to Mulberry and Bartow in 1912. The line crossed the Atlantic Coast Line Railroad's Bone Valley Branch (which is today CSX's Bone Valley Subdivision) in Mulberry. The junction of these two lines is today located in the median of State Road 37. The line also connected to the Charlotte Harbor and Northern Railway (currently CSX's Achan Subdivision) in Mulberry which at the time went as far as Port Boca Grande where a vast majority of phosphate was shipped in the early 20th century.

By 1916, Seaboard would extend the line east from Bartow to Lake Wales, Alcoma, and Hesperides. Track east of Bartow to Lake Wales has since been abandoned (the junction where the Plant City Subdivision meets the CSX S Line is still known today as Lake Wales Junction because of this extension). Track from just east of Bartow (at a point known historically as Pembroke Junction) south to Homeland was part of a Seaboard spur built in 1914 to the now-defunct Coronet Pembroke Mine.

Seaboard built the Valrico Cutoff in 1925 which connected the Seaboard main line (CSX's S Line) at Valrico with the track at Welcome. This is today is the westernmost trackage of the line. Seaboard designated the line as the Valrico Subdivision.[3] With the Valrico Cutoff in place, the Valrico Subdivision would additionally become an important route for Seaboard's passenger trains as it provided a direct route from Tampa to Miami (which was accessed through the Seaboard's line to Miami in Lake Wales, which was also completed in the 1920s). Seaboard would operate the Cross Florida Limited over the line, which was one of the first rail services to connect Tampa and Miami directly.[3]

Homeland to Bowling Green

CSX train passing the historic Fort Meade Depot (milepost AX 875.13) on the Valrico Subdivision.

See also: Florida Southern Railway

The oldest trackage of the current Varico Subdivision is its south-easternmost trackage from Homeland (just south of Bartow) to Fort Meade and Bowling Green. This segment was built in 1886 by the Florida Southern Railway as their Charlotte Harbor Division (which later became the Atlantic Coast Line Railroad's Fort Myers Line).[5] Today, this segment of the Valrico Subdivision ends less than a mile south of the Polk/Hardee County line in Bowling Green. The line was abandoned between Bowling Green and Arcadia in the late 1980s. Former Atlantic Coast Line depots still stand along the line in Fort Meade and Bowling Green. The Bowling Green depot stands about a hundred yards south of where the track now ends.

Later years

The Atlantic Coast Line and Seaboard Air Line Railroads merged in 1967 to form the Seaboard Coast Line Railroad, which brought all of the track under a single owner. In the Seaboard Coast Line era, the Valrico Subdivision designation continued to covered the line from Valrico east through Bartow and West Lake Wales, which was still in service at the time (track east of West Lake Wales was redesignated as the Lake Wales Subdivision, which is now the Florida Midland Railroad). The track from Homeland to Bowling Green (which continued to Arcadia at the time) was part of the Fort Myers Subdivision.[6] Track was removed east of Bartow by 1982.[7] When the Fort Myers Subdivision south of Bowling Green was abandoned in the late 1980s, the remaining track was annexed to the Valrico Subdivision. In 1980, the Seaboard Coast Line's parent company merged with the Chessie System, creating the CSX Corporation. The CSX Corporation initially operated the Chessie and Seaboard Systems separately until 1986, when they were merged into CSX Transportation.

Milepost numbers

See also: CSX milepost prefixes

Despite being a continuous line today, the milepost numbers on the Valrico Subdivision are not continuous throughout and remain as they originally were under predecessor companies (the Atlantic Coast Line and the Seaboard Air Line).

The segment from Valrico to Welcome Junction (the Valrico Cutoff) is numbered independently from the rest of the line since that was the last track segment to be built. It is numbered SZ 0.0 through SZ 11.8.

From Welcome Junction east to Bartow, the mileposts are numbered SV 834.2 through SV 851.1 (numbering which continues from the Plant City Subdivision). When the line turns south on to the former Seaboard Pembroke Mine spur in Bartow, the numbering continues with the prefix SVE since the SV prefix continued along the former east continuation to West Lake Wales.

In Homeland, where the line transitions to the former Atlantic Coast Line track, the mileposts abruptly change at approximately SVE 857.3 to AX 870.8 reflecting the Atlantic Coast Line numbering. The line today ends at AX 882.7.[2]

See also

• List of CSX Transportation lines

References

1. V. E. McKelvey and others, "Domestic Phosphate Deposits", US Geological Survey, Open-File Report 53-165, 1953.
2. CSX Jacksonville Division Timetable
3. Seaboard Air Line Railroad South Florida Division Timetable (1940)
4. Atlantic Coast Line Railroad Southern Division Timetable (1949)
5. Turner, Gregg (2003). A Short History of Florida Railroads. Arcadia Publishing. ISBN 978-0-7385-2421-4.
6. Seaboard Coast Line Railroad Jacksonville Division and Tampa Division Timetable (1977)
7. Seaboard Coast Line Railroad Jacksonville Division and Tampa Division Timetable (1982)

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