The people who work on trains have a variety of jobs. A Norfolk Southern flagman inspects a train near Marion, Ohio. Dale A. DeVene Jr. The people who work on trains have a variety of jobs. Each member of a train crew has a specific function. Since train crews do most of their work beyond […]
The traditional life cycle for new locomotives on a Class I roster would be revenue service, followed by lease return if the railroad leased the power or retirement and sale if they were purchased. In a handful of cases, power that departed a Class I roster will find its way back into its original owner’s […]
Just when you think recent progress in railroad preservation can’t get any better — I’m thinking here of everything from Big Boy to Reading & Northern 2102 to Silvis Shops to Michigan Central Station — along comes another milestone that, if not quite a blockbuster, is still remarkable. Especially if you’re interested in diesel […]
Abraham Lincoln railcar In early 2023, I had the unique opportunity to take a step back in time, experiencing a short ride on a privately owned railcar. I was able to see what it might have been like to be a railroad president inspecting his territory. The car, the Abraham Lincoln, with owners in the […]
Track classifications are among the most basic — and essential — operating considerations in railroading, and an army of workers keep watch over the rails. You’ve seen them out there nearly every day in their hi-rail trucks, motoring quietly up and down the main and not-so-main lines of America. Perhaps you’ve waited for them to […]
Locomotive controls Locomotive controls remained fairly standardized since diesels first invaded the roundhouses of America’s railroads in the 1930s. There’s a throttle, a reverser (to determine direction), a handle to control the locomotive’s independent brake, and an automatic brake handle to slow or stop the movement using the air brakes of the entire train. Since […]
In 1981, I was a locomotive engineer for the Chicago & North Western Railway based out of Council Bluffs, Iowa, and operating an interdivisional run to Sioux City, Iowa. I made this run many times, but one trip taught me a lesson about troubleshooting a diesel locomotive — and about railroading. Most of the trains […]
Hydrogen locomotive Hydrogen powered locomotives have been getting plenty of press lately, with several railroads, large and small, taking the concept seriously. Long before the current plethora of projects however, BNSF, in conjunction with Vehicle Projects, a Colorado-based fuel-cell company with transportation interests, commissioned a prototype hydrogen locomotive in the early 2000s. The core of […]
Transcontinental Railroad Workers who built the first Transcontinental Railroad, by hand, in the late 1860s labored through grueling heat, biting winter cold, snow, attacks from Native American tribes, and long, long work days. Learn how they did it with this excerpt from one of Trains’ DVD’s, Journey To Promontory, available from the Kalmbach Hobby Store. […]
Norfolk Southern high hoods The high-hood locomotive once numbered in the hundreds on the Norfolk Southern roster, charged with every duty from high-value manifest trains to slow coal drags. Some even helped pull the curtain down on the last steam-powered branch lines. Now, their numbers have been decimated down to the double digits, their duties […]
The Washington Central Railroad’s Spirit of Washington dinner train started running in 1989. Originally, it operated for a few years along the Yakama River Canyon in Eastern Washington, before moving to the east side of Lake Washington to run on Burlington Northern’s Woodinville Subdivision. The 44-mile round trip to the Columbia Winery in Woodinville departed […]
F125 “Spirit” commuter locomotive The F125 “Spirit” commuter locomotive offers something different at Southern California commuter stations. While a modern fleet of homogenized locomotives is great for the financial bottom line, and certainly easier for the maintenance workers who care for them, aren’t you secretly hoping it will not be business as usual behind that […]
