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I doubt the 1981 build date. It might have been overhauled at that time, but I'm sure the bridge has been there for much longer than that. That being said, it's on their Twin Cities - Chicago mainline, and the line has seen a considerable amount of freight and passenger traffic over the years, even ...

Sorry, meant to say SW of Champaign, not Springfield. Must have had the Simpsons on in the background when I wrote it.

I was wond-ering about the picture on lower part of page of the Second Quarter 2015 "Central Headlight" (Vol. XLV, No.2). It shows an Indiana Harbor Belt H-5u 2-8-2, with a caption saying the picture was taken "at Hammond, Illinois in September 1938". There is a Hammond IL, about...

What would BNSF's name be today if, like UP, the largest railroad in a merger had kept its name? For example, Burlington Northern was made up of GN, NP, SP&S and CB&Q.. Which of those four was the largest? (I think it was GN..but im not sure) Lets say it was GN..So in this alternate timelin...

Neat!! I have this on videotape, forgot which company offered it on VHS maybe 20 years ago. I don't know that it's ever been offered on DVD.

IIRC the Union railroad originally looked at 2-10-2s but they didn't fit their existing turntables, so they ordered the engines as 0-10-2s...but they were still pretty much built to the design of a typical 2-10-2 but without pilot wheels.

As I recall, years ago Mel said in an interview that as part of the settlement, his dad was given funds specifically for education / retraining, and used it to study electronics or computer programming. Eventually he found a good tech job in Australia so moved the family there when Mel was a teenager.

IIRC the original 19th century Empire State Express was a daytime train between New York City and Buffalo - entirely within "the Empire State" of New York.

Don't know if this helps, but a "blind pig" was a generic term for an unlicensed illegal bar or saloon, often run out of someone's house or in an otherwise legitimate businesses' building. Blind pigs were apparently common 100 years ago or more...one of the historical societies I belong to...

[quote="lvanorail"] I mean it's pretty clear what B&O or Erie were named after. Was it always just the big points they connected? quote] I'm not sure it's all that clear...IIRC the Baltimore and Ohio RR was built to connect Baltimore to the Ohio River, I'm sure many people assume it's ...

I might be wrong, but it seems to me at that point the old CNW and Milwaukee tracks are pretty far apart horizontally - the Milwaukee tracks are quite a bit higher up??

Luecke's "The Milwaukee Road in Minnesota" book has several late steam-era pics of Milwaukee freights on the short line.

...plus, remember bankruptcy is a tool corporations use to reorganize and stave off creditors. It doesn't mean the company is ceasing operations or abandoning facilities. Many railroads have gone through bankruptcy, some several times, and some were in bankruptcy for many years...still operating tra...

I got to see this engine on Oct 9th, heading south in a consist that was sitting stopped at Newport MN on the BNSF (ex-CB&Q) mainline between the Twin Cities and Chicago. I was very happy, since although NS units are pretty common on that line (I believe due to a Chicago - St.Paul run-thru agree...

On the old Hudson Division Engineers' Rosters, as well as those of other divisions, engineers had to have a special qualification to run the Century as indicated by a reference mark next to their names. This applied to both regular men who owned the runs and to extra list enginemen. If a non-qualif...

Neat picture!! I was at the museum a couple of years ago on "Great Northern Day" and got to ride in the cab of 400 - my only railroad cab ride (short as it was) to date.