Train time at Chadron, Nebr. Way out on Chicago & North Western’s lonely “Cowboy Line,” 4-6-2 No. 1588 arrives Chadron, Nebr., with daily-except-Sunday train 13 from Omaha, 447 miles to the east. The train is bound for Rapid City, S.Dak., 104 miles west. Fred H. Ragsdale photo […]
4-8-2 on the Creole’s connection Illinois Central 4-8-2 No. 2438 pulls out of Carbondale, Ill., with train 208, the St. Louis connection for the Creole, in September 1954. Philip R. Hastings photo […]
Rock Island TA diesel Electro-Motive Corp.’s model TA passenger diesel of 1937 was a lighter, less powerful counterpart to the builder’s EA of the same year. Although they shared the same styling, the single-engine, 1,200 h.p., B-B TA was a derivative of EMC’s power cars for streamlined trains, while the twin-engine, 1,800 h.p., A1A-A1A EA […]
Perched high on a hillside on a lonely but breathtakingly beautiful stretch of Interstate 80 just outside of Echo, Utah, must be the best rest stop in America – for railfans. With a sweeping view of the rough, red, sandstone cliffs of Echo Canyon, frequent trains on Union Pacific’s original transcontinental route, and convenient benches […]
North East is a borough of about 4,200 people and is the northernmost incorporated community in Pennsylvania. It is little more than a mile from the shore of Lake Erie, and just 3 miles off Interstate 90. The community, located in northwestern Pennsylvania, is named North East for its location in northeastern Erie County. The […]
Scenic Bear Mountain is located about 45 miles north of New York City along the Hudson River. It offers a host of vantage points along the CSX Transportation “River Line” and Metro-North Hudson Line. Locations between Cold Spring and Peekskill, including Bear Mountain Bridge, provide public access to watch and photograph trains. The area is […]
The Quad Cities of Davenport and Bettendorf, Iowa, and Rock Island and Moline, Ill., straddle the Mississippi River, creating an historic intersection of river and rails. In April 1856, the Chicago, Rock Island & Pacific’s predecessors opened the first Mississippi River crossing, known as the Government Bridge, at Davenport. Later, a riverboat struck the bridge […]
The nation’s 10th largest city, San Jose has been flirting with the 1 million population mark for several years. Within the city and surrounding Santa Clara County are 74 passenger rail stations, 62 of them on the Valley Transportation Authority’s light rail system. The remainder serve one of three passenger carriers: Amtrak, Caltrain, and the […]
A century ago, a quirky group of railroads built with their rails just 2 feet apart sprawled across the wilderness of Maine. The narrow gauge railroads were cheaper to build and could go places standard gauge roads could not. By the 1920s, there were five narrow gauge railroads in the state, from the 112-mile Sandy […]
The town of Sykesville, a community of about 4,400, is nestled in the Maryland hills about 25 miles west of Baltimore. Visiting Baldwin’s Station restaurant (www.baldwinsstation.com), in the old Baltimore & Ohio station, is like traveling back in time 130 years. The station’s ornate design includes a B&O 0-8-0 Camel steam locomotive-inspired chimney, original jeweled […]
New London is located in Huron County in north-central Ohio, about 20 miles south of Lake Erie. The community, incorporated in 1853 by settlers from Connecticut, features a junction between CSX Transportation’s northern Ohio main line, a former New York Central route, and the Wheeling & Lake Erie Railway’s former Akron, Canton & Youngstown main […]
Pastoral Belen remained a New Mexico farming village after the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe Railway pushed track down the Rio Grande River valley toward Texas and Mexico in 1880. Even Bronco Bill and Kid Johnson killing the sheriff and a deputy in a gunbattle after robbing a train south of town proved only a temporary sensation. Then the Belen Cutoff, the Santa […]
