# C.P. Crane Power Plant, back in DA day?



## captaintommy (Feb 12, 2015)

Anyone remember fishing on the bridge down Carroll Island Road? the property owned by C.P. Crane Power Plant? that place was the best..
one could catch everything off that bridge, and on the banks....crabs, bluefish, perch, bass, rockfish. In the winter the bite would be really good with the warm water discharge... I used to fish there for years.. until a bunch of hillbillies kept trashing the place, and setting bonfires... the employees were so sick of cleaning the place up, they closed it. that was one of the saddest things.


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## zam (Jun 16, 2004)

I always thought the biggest mistake there was putting out trash bags along the trail, that just invited people to put trash in them instead of leaving with it, then the bags got over filled and no one took the bags away. the people that put the bags there meant well, but it made things way worse


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## surfnsam (Apr 28, 2008)

I fished chaulk point when I was a kid with my pops. Trudging through the snow and freezing but always came home with dinner. Very sad when they closed the canal.


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## catman (May 28, 2001)

I was down that way about a month ago and decided to see if it was still closed. Yep - chain link fence/gate across the road. I spent a few enjoyable winter days fishing the canal and always came home with something for the table. Wish it was still open.


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## Gnatman (Sep 15, 2005)

captaintommy said:


> Anyone remember fishing on the bridge down Carroll Island Road? the property owned by C.P. Crane Power Plant? that place was the best..
> one could catch everything off that bridge, and on the banks....crabs, bluefish, perch, bass, rockfish. In the winter the bite would be really good with the warm water discharge... I used to fish there for years.. until a bunch of hillbillies kept trashing the place, and setting bonfires... the employees were so sick of cleaning the place up, they closed it. that was one of the saddest things.



Actually,it was closedas a result of 9/11, just like Conowingo dam.


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## Tracker01 (Apr 4, 2011)

Chalk point is scheduled to be closed with in the the next 2 years.


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## captaintommy (Feb 12, 2015)

Gnatman said:


> Actually,it was closedas a result of 9/11, just like Conowingo dam.


It was closed for the trash.. I have been inside the plant a couple times for work, and spoke to the plant manager about it. Definitely was the trash issue. though I think it would be legal to take a canoe or kayak and paddle in from Dundee Marina or somethere.. one just has to be careful for rocks near there the poles span cross the canal. I bet that place is stocked full of fish due to no fishing


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## zam (Jun 16, 2004)

captaintommy said:


> It was closed for the trash.. I have been inside the plant a couple times for work, and spoke to the plant manager about it. Definitely was the trash issue. though I think it would be legal to take a canoe or kayak and paddle in from Dundee Marina or somethere.. one just has to be careful for rocks near there the poles span cross the canal. I bet that place is stocked full of fish due to no fishing


No your not allowed to go in by boat/kayak, theres signs on the cables that you can't go any farther. I always heard the main reason was the trash but I have seen military vehicles go in there, I always though that had something to do with it to


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## catman (May 28, 2001)

zam said:


> No your not allowed to go in by boat/kayak, theres signs on the cables that you can't go any farther. I always heard the main reason was the trash but I have seen military vehicles go in there, I always though that had something to do with it to


Maybe some misdirected ordinance landed there from APG.


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## chesapeakecarper (Aug 22, 2003)

Here's me at Carroll Island in 1972. Been fishing since I was a little squirt and remember when they closed access for good. That was a sad, but predictable, day.


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## chesapeakecarper (Aug 22, 2003)

The place was closed because of trash, the cretins with their piles of pallets and bonfires and drinking. The Belly-boater Bassers, if I recall, were the ones to put up the bags along the trail. People actually DID put trash in the bags but the bags were not removed and emptied so became an even greater eyesore. The Russian and ethnic carpers trashed the opposite rocky point through the fenceline and next to the tank farm...best spot overall point on the channel edge.Damn shame.


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## captaintommy (Feb 12, 2015)

chesapeakecarper said:


> View attachment 14654
> 
> 
> Here's me at Carroll Island in 1972. Been fishing since I was a little squirt and remember when they closed access for good. That was a sad, but predictable, day.


that's a great photo..blast from the past... thanks for posting it chesapeakecarper.. 

i used to dip net shiners from the bridge... using bread to lure them in... then would put the shiners on the bobbers, and caught all kinds of stuff.. 
when I was like 13 I remember using a rooster tail from shore..and counted catching over 50 white perch...and even a few monster catfish that took the rooster tail too... 

that place had any and everything.. 

caught some 20-25inch rockfish too, across the bridge, on the right side..in those coves... using topwater buzzbait at twilight..when rockfish would come in 3 feet of water to eat baby rockfish.. "yesterday..yesterday, all my troubles seemed so faraway" ahhh


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## chesapeakecarper (Aug 22, 2003)

I remember people doing that...was that you??!!

Seriously, the Power Plant Lifestyle was an entire angling sub culture all to itself defying the conventional edicts on angling, and unfortunately reinforcing the worst tendencies of human behavior.

My greatest sadness is that I can't take my kids down there to pass along the passion. It's a pleasure they will never know or experience.


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## zam (Jun 16, 2004)

I bet the Bass are stacked up in there this winter with all this ice


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## Dave.b (Aug 29, 2013)

I remember the power plant being off limits way before 9/11. I also remember my father taking us there when we were kids and the place being a madhouse.Too much trash and too many drunks causing problems. I still don't understand why people need to get wasted to catch fish.


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## chesapeakecarper (Aug 22, 2003)

The worst drunks congregated on the bank by the back gate of the plant next to the coal pile. They brought down piles of pallets that they burned in barrels, sitting around BS'ing, carousing and drinking. And I don't even think these people fished that much, they were just lowlife thugs that had an open air liquor pit and sh*t hole. Anglers just left paper and all sorts of trash and dead mud shad (for the feral cats) littering the bridge and ground; beer cans along the trail. The power plant staff came out once in a while to warn everyone to chill and behave or it would be closed, signs were even erected as warning ahead of time. But nooooo...









Old gate pic from shortly after the closure.


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## Dave.b (Aug 29, 2013)

It's sad that such a productive place was ruined by the people that should have taken care of it...fishermen. The drunks just made it worse. Every time I visit the choptank piers I say the same thing that one day the state will get tired of the trash and trashy people and close them off to the public. I hope not.


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## wdbrand (May 24, 2007)

I'm curious captaintommy. Could you describe what a hillbilly looks like and where he comes from?


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## captaintommy (Feb 12, 2015)

wdbrand said:


> I'm curious captaintommy. Could you describe what a hillbilly looks like and where he comes from?


It's not about what a hillbilly looks like and where he/she comes from. I consider myself a hillbilly btw ya'll ha'll. I should have said..these 'ignert hillbillies would always trash the place and get drunk'..etc.. 

perhaps in a few years, when I retire... I should consider trying to get that placed opened up again. Propose some plan to BGE/Exelon there.. get DNR involved..make it political (like open space, access to fishing, handi-capp access) and perhaps do a 'paid' visitor pass system' or ' $20 membership per year system' and use those funds to hire a gate-guard, buy trash bags... 

shoot I'd pay $20 to $40 a year to fish there per year.. and with a 'membership system' , members would report other (ignert hillbilly) members trashing the place.. and could get them kicked out.


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## catman (May 28, 2001)

Hey wdbrand, I'm a hillbilly and I come from my mama. You got a problem with that?








That's what I thought.


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## wdbrand (May 24, 2007)

You wouldn't make a pimple on a hillbillies ass. Probably don't know how to load pallets so you can haul more either. OOPS, just noticed you come from yankee land, so you are to be ignerted.


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## catman (May 28, 2001)

Hey wdbrand you've been on my *IGNORE LIST* for at least 4 yrs. so I can't read any of your responses. Here's the message I get - *This message is hidden because wdbrand is on your ignore list.* As I remember you couldn't take a little harmless ribbing back then and nothing has changed I see.


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## Dave.b (Aug 29, 2013)

wdbrand said:


> You wouldn't make a pimple on a hillbillies ass. Probably don't know how to load pallets so you can haul more either. OOPS, just noticed you come from yankee land, so you are to be ignerted.


The issue was never people loading pallets, but with 40 year old adolescents burning them and getting blitzed all under the guise of "fishing." Maybe if they loaded some of the pallets with the garbage they left behind the area would still be open. A handful of knuckle draggers ruined a good spot for future generations.


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## Dave.b (Aug 29, 2013)

Gnatman said:


> Actually,it was closedas a result of 9/11, just like Conowingo dam.


Conowingo is still open to fishermen...just can't enter the catwalk area. In fact Exelon built a wharf for people to fish off of.


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## zam (Jun 16, 2004)

I don't know if the guys who stood around the fire and drank had anything to do with it closing, but I worked with a couple of those guys in a factory back in about 1982 and they were hanging out there even back then, they would actually walk around and try to get people to clean up their mess, they did seem to get more new guys hanging there as the years went by though


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