The route is looking real good I believe this is the line that goes up through Santos Dumont after which it has
to climb an escarpment several hundred meters. We got a contract to do the signals on this line sometime
after the steel route which was built new in the 1980s and is several kilometers to the west. However the
routes cross at a point further north with the steel rouite being on top and the final destimation of both
being the area of Belo Horizonte. The steel route, or at least a part of it, is in my bucket list and I do have
the necessary documentation. Signal rules though are totally different from anything in the US. A friend of
mine, a very good signal designer, sketched out the typicals for the signal design and I did the CAD work
from his sketches. Eventually we had a couple hundred typicals. A typical is a drawing that covers most
of the bases for a particular physical item, say a crossover, or a end of siding or double track, or an
intermediate signal. Then designers take the typical & mark it up to meet the actual requirements and a
CAD operator then makes the definitive changes to the "electronic" typical and after checking by an
experienced and probably senior designer, it become part of the package sent to, in this case, MRS. At
first the bungalows, cases, etc. were wired here in Jacksonville & sent to Brazil but import issues got
in the way, so our company opened a design office in Belo Horizonte and we just sent the design drawings
electronically from Jacksonville to there. So keep it up, I'll probably "borrow" some of your buildings
for the route I hope to do.
Jerry Sullivan, P.E. (retired from CSX & SR)
docent: C&TS RR
Florida, USA
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