Action may be required on your Trains.com account in order to continue accessing content. Click here to learn more.
News & Products for the week of September 5th 2023 Model railroad operators and builders can get the latest information about locomotives, freight cars, passenger cars, tools, track, and more by reading Model Railroader’s frequent product updates. The following are the products Model Railroader editors have news on for the week of September 5th […]
I’m heartened to see Amtrak intends to explore a 200-mph Dallas-Houston passenger rail service in cooperation with Texas Central Partners. Having driven I-45 between the two megacities, I can vouch for its clear need and likely success. Not all of Amtrak’s plans have succeeded as envisioned, unfortunately. One, in particular, comes to mind: the short-lived […]
First of two parts EFFINGHAM, Ill, —What happens when electrical current connected with signal systems doesn’t reliably travel from one rail to another when a train passes? Dispatchers “lose” the train — it disappears from their screens — and warning lights don’t flash or gates don’t lower at highway crossings as the train approaches. The […]
ORLANDO, Fla. — Officials in Florida’s Orange County will be asked to approve a special development district to help pay for an 11-mile rail line that would link Brightline and SunRail service to Orlando International Airport, the county’s convention center, and theme parks, the Orlando Sentinel reports in a paywalled article. Universal City Development Partners, […]
Some of Britain’s iconic High Speed Train locomotives and cars are currently in transit across the Atlantic to Mexico for use on a rail line being rebuilt for the Mexican government in a project led by the country’s Navy. The British HST equipment, along with two Spanish built ‘tram-train’ light rail vehicles previously used for […]
PLATTSBURGH, N.Y. — Amtrak has resumed selling tickets for the much-interrupted Adirondack to Montreal and plans to resume service on Sept. 11, WAER radio reports, but the station quotes an Amtrak spokesman as saying the company still needs to “work out several operational details to make that date happen.” Operations north of Albany were […]
HYANNIS, Mass. — A Massachusetts legislator has announced plans for a bill that would revive daily commuter train service to Cape Cod, currently served by the summer-weekend-only CapeFlyer service. The Cape Cod Times reports state Rep. Dylan Fernandes said this week that the service would ease congestion on the Cape’s major roadways and bridges across […]
NEWARK, N.J. — NJ Transit engineers have voted overwhelmingly in favor of a strike, the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen has announced. The union said in a Thursday press release that 81% of those eligible to vote returned their ballots, and 100% of those ballots supported a strike authorization. The exact breakdown: 494 members […]
SOUTH SAN FRANCISCO, Calif. — Caltrain has energized the second traction power substation for the electrification of its San Francisco-San Jose main line, another step toward the planned launch of electrified operation in fall 2024. The agency announced the substation, built by Balfour Beatty and its partners had been powered up by Pacific Gas & […]
Begun in 1905, the Tonopah & Tidewater extended from the Santa Fe main line at Ludlow, Calif., 160 lonely miles north into Nevada. In the late 1920s T&T acquired a gas-electric car and began handling, in partnership with Union Pacific, a twice-weekly Pullman car that ran from Los Angeles to Death Valley, pictured here before […]
A Frisco caboose ride provided a much needed railfan break during my military assignment near Kansas City. My spirits fell when I received orders for my first U.S. Air Force permanent-duty assignment, at the Richards-Gebaur Air Force Base just south of Kansas City, Mo. I had hardly been west of the Appalachian Mountains, and […]
NEW HAVEN, Conn. — Amtrak is temporarily increasing the number of its trains that will cross-honor tickets for Connecticut’s Shore Line East commuter service because of Shore Line East schedule changes to accommodate an Amtrak maintenance-of-way project. Shore Line East service will be reduced during that project. The schedule changes and cross-honoring are effective Sept. […]
