My last photograph of Chicago's Brighton Junction. July 18th 2007.

An end of another era of Chicago railroading came to an end in early July of 2007. The signal operator at Chicago's Brighton Junction near Archer and Western Avenues, raised and lowered the manual semaphore signals for the last time on approximately July 3rd 2007. This is how the junction location looked like after the semaphore signals were dismantled and removed. The tall signal bridge shown here gives one an idea, of the transition taking place. At last report, the shanty has since been removed from the crosstracks. Word has it that the Norfolk Southern is consideing making the shanty and semaphore signals into a future museum display.