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Ill. Last Manned Rail Tower Torn Down
SPRINGFIELD, Ill. (AP) -- The last manned railroad control tower in Illinois and one of the last in the country has been torn down.

The (Springfield) State Journal-Register reports that workers from Springfield's Parkland Environmental Group demolished Ridgely Tower on Monday.

That means a computer in Nebraska is now controlling traffic on the rail line.

For about 100 years, a worker staffed Ridgely Tower around-the-clock. The control operator used a radio to communicate with engineers and maintenance crews. More recently, the operator also watched rail traffic on a computer.

The operator then used a series of iron levers to manually change switches on the tracks to route traffic safely.

Those levers were salvaged from the demolition site Monday and now belong to a railroad historian in Missouri.

(Copyright 2011 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
08 08 11 by Newsroom
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