Tabla de contenidos para April 2025 en Trains

CANADIAN NATIONAL HAS UNVEILED a battery-diesel hybrid locomotive developed in collaboration with Knoxville Locomotive Works. The 3,200-hp Q19-2.4GH, released in January, will be tested at locations including yards and branch lines in Tennessee, Mississippi, and Louisiana, along with eventual cold-weather testing in Western Canada. The unit is powered by a 2.4 megawatt-hour/700-hp, biofuel-ready engine. It aims for a 50% reduction in fuel consumption compared to a typical yard or local-service locomotive, leading to emission reductions as well as contributing to the advance of hybrid technology. A former BNSF genset locomotive provided the core for the hybrid unit. “We believe that this hybrid system, if successful, could substantially reduce green house gas emissions from our yard operations, while maintaining our commitment to customers and communities across our network,” Patrick Whitehead, executive vice…

SHANE FREDERICKSON LOOKS COMFORTABLE sitting in the fireman’s seat of Reading & Northern No. 2102, as the big 4-8-4 makes a 16-mile backup move from the Port Clinton steam shops to North Reading to couple onto 2024’s first Iron Horse Ramble train. A fourth-generation railroader, Frederickson is R&N’s most senior engineer, hiring out on the Blue Mountain & Reading in 1983. He continually fine-tunes valves controlling the engine’s stoker and water inputs. Chuck Trusdell is at the throttle; the two engineers will split the running over the daylong trip to the tourist town of Jim Thorpe and return. Frederickson is carefully listening to every sound of the engine. In a short time, No. 2102 will singlehandedly lead a 15-car train filled with 600 passengers. Reading & Northern lets the big…

BLS’ ROUTE VIA THE ORIGINAL LÖTSCHBERG TUNNEL is another on the long list of scenic mountain rail routes in Switzerland; passenger service on that line is hourly. Kandersteg, the small town (population about 1,200) near the tunnel’s north portal, is a hiking and skiing destination in a spectacular setting. Its long tourism history predates the rail line, and outside of town is the International Scout Centre, home of the World Organization of the Scouting Movement. I stayed at the Chalet Hotel Adler [in German: https://www.chalethotel.ch/, or at Hotels.com]; my small single room had one of the greatest balcony views imaginable. There are plenty of lodging options, most within a short walk of the train station. To learn more, visit the Travel Switzerland website (www.myswitzerland.com/en-us/); search for “Kandersteg.” (Among items that will come up…

ROUTE 66 HAS LARGELY BEEN replaced by Interstate 40 across Arizona and New Mexico, and hasn’t officially been a U.S. highway since 1985. But the Main Street of America still occupies a big place in American culture and has become a tourist attraction in its own right. Like railroads merged out of existence, Route 66 lives on in the minds of its admirers and its surviving segments remain great railfan roads, especially paralleling BNSF’s former Santa Fe Southern Transcon through Arizona and New Mexico. Both BNSF and Route 66 run from Chicago to the Los Angeles area. But the “modern” (post-1937) Route 66 doesn’t come alongside the Southern Transcon until the middle of New Mexico, east of Laguna along BNSF’s Gallup Subdivision. The Gallup Sub and the adjacent Seligman Subdivision to…

BOWING TO COMPETITIVE PRESSURE from other western railroads, the Union Pacific finally added dome cars to some of its named trains in 1955. A 35-car, $10 million order with American Car & Foundry brought 10 dome-chair cars, 10 domediners and 15 dome-loungeobservation cars to the railroad. The UP was the only railroad to offer dome-dining cars in its passenger fleet. Counting dome-diner Sky View from General Motors’ Train of Tomorrow, the UP rostered 11 dome-diners. In 1971, with the onset of Amtrak, the UP disbursed its excess passenger cars. Dome-diner No. 8003 was acquired by the National Railroad Museum in Green Bay, Wis. No. 8003 is one of six remaining today and is the only one still in original condition with furniture, fixtures, and artwork all in place. The other…

THE CALIFORNIA AIR RESOURCES BOARD HAS SCRAPPED its controversial rule that would have required use of zero-emissions locomotives in the state beginning in 2030. CARB informed the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency in January that it was withdrawing its requests to enforce zero-emissions rules covering trucks and locomotives. The move came a week before the inauguration of President Donald Trump, who frequently criticized CARB’s regulatory efforts. “Withdrawal is an important step given the uncertainty presented by the incoming administration that previously attacked California’s programs to protect public health and the climate and has said it will continue to oppose those programs,” CARB Chair Liane Randolph said in a statement. Because CARB’s regulations are stricter than those at the federal level, the agency requires waivers from the EPA in order to enforce…

THE DEATH OF FORMER PRESIDENT Jimmy Carter in December of last year and the recent inauguration of another president brought back a flood of memories. It also reminded me of how railroading can take you places you otherwise might never get to see. I was in Washington, D.C., on Jan. 20, 1977, the day of Carter’s inauguration. Standing on a flimsy wood locomotive. Next to a large plaster horse. On top of a borrowed U.S. Marine Corps trailer. Experiencing the early stages of hypothermia. How I ended up in charge of the Association of American Railroads float in the inaugural parade is a long story. CALLING IN FAVORS A few months before, the City of Baltimore had “requested” that Chessie System create a suitable float for a Jan. 2, 1977,…

Nobody does railroad tunnels quite like the Swiss. But even the Swiss have never done a major tunnel quite like this. The Lötschberg Base Tunnel, a 34.6-kilometer (21.5-mile) tunnel that is part of the extensive New Railway Link through the Alps, or NRLA, opened in 2007. More than two decades later, they’re finally going to finish it. The base tunnel — “base” distinguishes it from an earlier Lötschberg Tunnel, dating to 1913 and still in use — runs from Frutigen, in the canton of Bern, south to Raron, in the canton of Valais. It was designed to have two single-track tunnels for its full length. But for cost and political reasons, the tunnel only has 14 kilometers of double track, at its southern end. The rest is single track. This…

Aseemingly constant feature of the railfan landscape since the mid-1900s has been the depressing succession of abandonments, some of which have come to be greatly regretted. In a twist only slightly less surprising than the proverbial “man bites dog” headline, an unlikely drama came to play out in the 2010s. A wealthy New Yorker employed the services of a couple of Tennessee firms to rejuvenate a moribund rail line on the Western prairie. This is the story of how a former Missouri Pacific main line once on the chopping block came back to life as the Colorado Pacific. THE SETTING Follow Kansas Route 96 west and north across the state. At each successive town, the population dips and the elevation rises. Wichita, 400,000 people living 1,300 feet above sea level.…

THE FEDERAL RAILROAD ADMINISTRATION will allow Parallel Systems to test its autonomous, self-propelled flatcar system on two Genesee & Wyoming short lines in Georgia. The FRA in January approved the request, made in August 2023 by Parallel, Georgia Central Railway, and Heart of Georgia Railroad, to allow testing of the battery-electric container cars, which take aim at short-haul intermodal markets. The agency’s Railroad Safety Board reviewed the waiver petition and supporting documentation, attended a demonstration at the MxV Rail test facility in Pueblo, Colo., and conducted a public hearing. “The Board has determined that granting the Petitioners’ request … is in the public interest and consistent with railroad safety,” Karl Alexy, the FRA’s associate administrator for railroad safety, wrote in a Jan. 16 letter to Georgia Central Railway President James Irvin.…

THE SURFACE TRANSPORTATION BOARD HAS APPROVED Canadian National’s acquisition of 218-mile regional Iowa Northern Railway. The board’s decision, announced Jan. 15, 2025, also imposed several conditions to offset potential anticompetitive aspects of the $230 million deal. Among them: The development of a scheduled local service plan, keeping gateways open on commercially reasonable terms, and maintaining competitive access to locations with voluntary reciprocal switching agreements. The merger will become effective on Feb. 13. The board also approved a pair of related trackage-rights deals. CN gains trackage rights between Cedar Falls and Manly, Iowa; Iowa Northern gains rights from CN’s Chicago, Central & Pacific on routes out of Waterloo, Iowa. A 3-1 vote reflected a split on the board, which failed to meet its own July deadline to reach a decision in the…

It happens six afternoons a week. We’re inside Reading Blue Mountain & Northern’s headquarters at Port Clinton, Pa. The replica 19th-century offices usually are abuzz with activity, but shortly after 2 p.m., conversations seem to stop. Even the railroad’s alwaysbusy customer service representatives speak in muted tones. The day switcher crew has parked and shut down their green and yellow SW8 on a siding. The occasion? In a few minutes, the railroad’s North Reading Fast Freight will pass on its 228-mile round trip the length of the Main Line between North Reading and Pittston, Pa. It is the star among several scheduled “Fast Freight” trains. Class I roads may embrace the Precision Scheduled Railroading concept, but RBMN actually has the “scheduled” part. Train NRFF has a scheduled time by each…

IN THE MOUNTAINS ABOVE the Lötschberg Base Tunnel, the original Lötschberg Tunnel continues to serve as a relief valve for traffic through the lower route, as well as a shortcut for drivers. The older tunnel, built between 1907 and 1913, is 14.6 kilometers long (just over 9 miles). It connects Kandersteg on its north end and Goppenstein at the south, with portals at 1,200 meters (3,937 feet) and 1, 216 meters (3,990 feet) respectively. Its summit, at 4,070 feet, is the highest point on the main Swiss rail network. In October 2024, BLS finished a six-year, 180 million franc ($198 million) project to increase clearance and to convert it to the same sort of direct-fixed track structure as the base tunnel. BLS operates hourly passenger trains via this route; it also sees six…

Had something bad happened, we would be getting out of prison about now… In late September 1966, a young Dave Gunn, then with the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe’s Transportation Department (and later head of several transit agencies and president of Amtrak), Bill Paul (in the Economic Planning Group), and Warren Henry (assistant to the general manager) hatched a scheme to compare high-speed train resistances between trailer on flat car (TOFC) and container on flat car (COFC) trains. The goal was to estimate operating cost differences between these two train types. With no container trains on the Santa Fe, Dave contacted his good friend Jim McClellan, who worked with New York Central’s Strategic Planning Group. Jim (later senior vice president of planning for Norfolk Southern and now deceased), forever a…

THE STEAM ENGINE’S INVENTION and the conception of the modern railway rank among Britain’s great contributions to the world. In 2025, the United Kingdom is celebrating Railway 200, marking the bicentenary of the Stockton & Darlington Railway, which opened for service on Sept. 27, 1825. Located in the northeast of England, the Stockton & Darlington Railway was an evolutionary milestone. The world’s first public steam railway, the Stockton & Darlington’s first line connected coal mines near Shildon with the cities of Darlington and Stockton. The railway is widely acknowledged as paving the way for the explosive growth of the industry by successfully blending several crucial elements of railroading, including securing a charter from parliament, establishing public commercial operation of long trains carrying freight and passenger traffic, operating trains hauled by steam…