www.txrrhistory.com - Tower 109 - San Antonio

Crossing of the San Antonio Belt & Terminal Railway and the San Antonio & Aransas Pass Railroad

In 1917, the Missouri-Kansas-Texas (MKT, "Katy") railroad funded the construction of the San Antonio Belt & Terminal (SAB&T) Railway (and then leased it for 99 years) to provide switching services among railroads in the San Antonio area. One of the customers for the SAB&T's services was the San Antonio & Aransas Pass (SA&AP) Railroad which had a main line from Corpus Christi to Kerrville via central San Antonio. The SA&AP became controlled by the Southern Pacific (SP) system and was eventually merged into the Texas & New Orleans (T&NO) railroad, SP's principal operating company in Texas. Tower 109 was established in 1918 at a crossing of the SAB&T and SA&AP railroads in south central San Antonio, and was abandoned in 1959.

Location Map, Tower 109

Below: The 1952 republication of the 1912 Sanborn Fire Insurance map of San Antonio shows
the tower located immediately west of the crossing. Most likely, this map was updated sometime
after the construction of Tower 109 in 1918. Other than a "2" indicating a two story structure,
the writing on the map at the tower is illegible under high magnification.

 

Observations of A. Tyrrell Kott
"One of the interesting things about Tower 109 was that the otherwise double track line from Sloan Yard to the passenger depot necked down to single track to cross the SA&AP Kerrville branch right at the tower. An industry siding off the SA&AP also crossed the MKT single track a few feet north of the main line SA&AP crossing. I think the abandonment of Tower 109 was occasioned more by a drop in passenger and freight (to the freight station) movements on the double-single-double track MKT line than any traffic on the Kerrville branch. However, in late steam days, I used to see Mk-5 2-8-2s on the Kerrville branch with long strings of hoppers and gondolas from the same gravel quarry that it serves to this day. As an interesting note, Union Pacific did not realize that they still served a customer north of this crossing, and they took up the diamond in 2000 in error and disposed of it!! The industry (Judson Candy Co.) still received occasional tank cars of syrup and a piece of track had to be placed over the ex-SA&AP main with a crane every time a car had to be set out or retrieved! I was unable to get photos of the actual operation; does anyone have some?? This strange operation persisted for about a year. As for Tower 109, I measured it in the 1970s and it had been abandoned for years then. It was physically torn down in 1978 or so. I rode the Texas Special once a week to San Antonio from September, 1963 until it was cut off in the summer of 1965 and I remember that Tower 109 was abandoned then, although in much better condition. It must have been abandoned in 1960 or so."

The Judson Candy Co. mentioned in A. Tyrell Kott's discussion above, was located on South Flores St. served by the SAB&T where it is shown ending (dashed purple line of the Location Map above)  just south of Durango Blvd. The Judson factory is now being redeveloped as lofts.

Aerial Images, Tower 109 Vicinity

Above: This Microsoft Visual Earth image of the Tower 109 crossing shows that the SAB&T tracks have been removed,
but the ex-SA&AP tracks remain in use. The tower was located where debris now sits between the end of the parking lot
and the SA&AP tracks.

Above: This view is looking south down the SAB&T ROW toward the site of Tower 109. The ex-SA&AP trestle is at right. (Jim King photo, Sept. 2009)
Below: South of Tower 109, the scars of the former SAB&T wye junction are visible in this satellite image. This junction
connected SAB&T lines among Towers 109, 105 and 112. A small segment of the "Sunset Route" east/west main line
is visible in the lower left corner.

Last Revised: 1/30/2010 JGK - Contact the Texas Interlocking Towers Page.