Did any lighting stripes make it to PC?

I'm curious if anyone knows of any NYC diesel locomotives or electric motors that lasted into the merger still wearing lightning stripes. If so, the engine type(s), number(s) and a link or reference to photos would be most appreciated.

And to take it to an extreme, was there ever a lightning stripe survivor that got (gasp!) mating worms over the NYC logo? (like McGinnis-scheme FL-9s that had PC decals slapped on them).

I'd have to dig for the nitty gritty but the eyewitness answer to your question is YES.

Several of the electric motors out of Harmon and North White Plains were still in their stripes in 1969, as was an "F" unit I saw twice a week from a ballfield in the middle of the afternoon on the Harlem Division.

Painting was a slow process, thankfully.

Dieter/

What is a "lightning stripe"?

U-Haul wrote:What is a "lightning stripe"?

A lightning stripe is a diagonal jog in the horizontal stripe.NYC and D&H both used lightning stripes.Google it,many images will come up.

I thought it was the last thing you saw if you didn't get off the tracks fast enough........ Then again if you couldn't get out of the way of a Penn Central train fast enough you were either;

1.Deaf

2. Crippled

3. Drunk

4. Any combination of the above

Painting was a slow process. Someone once told me the only reason Jade Green was adopted was because the Central had a warehouse full of it that was paid for. Black was adopted for Units to hide dirt and peeling paint. I recall seeing for YEARS an RS3 that had it's original number, "Penn Central" painted on the sides, and on the ends, a Central Cigar Band logo.
That Unit survived like that for the first 12 years of Communist Rail!

D/

I think the only other railroad that would come close to Penn Central is Rock Island!

Dieter wrote: I recall seeing for YEARS an RS3 that had it's original number, "Penn Central" painted on the sides, and on the ends, a Central Cigar Band logo.

That Unit survived like that for the first 12 years of Communist Rail!

ConJob purged all of its Alcos by 1982, so I'm not sure what you saw in '88.

Likewise, Amtrak sold its RS-3s in 1986.

A RS-3M lasted until the early 1990s.
http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=106376

The one I described was on the HARLEM DIVISION outside of New York City right into Metro North.

D/

Dieter wrote:The one I described was on the HARLEM DIVISION outside of New York City right into Metro North.

When you used the term "Communist Rail", I figured you were referring to Conrail. It sounds like you may have seen an RS-3M on Amtrak. Considering amount of body modification needed for the rebuild program, I don't think an NYC paint job could have survived. Neither PC nor early CR had the money for such extravagances...

P.S. Thanks, U-haul, for the correction.

Hi Matt!

The first person you can credit for the "Communist Rail" euphamism was a pisssssed off Railfan in a place you might have heard of called Brighton. He and his fellow railfans were pretty upset in 1976 when all the flavors were merged into one that at the time, promised to be little better than Penn Central.

When everything was merged into one bland scheme, with the first Corporate name for a major railroad to boot, on some levels, yes, it certainly smacked of "Communism"

Time has shown us differently. Still, my friend still hisses "Communist Rail" to this day. Same thing as these foamers who whine about what Crash Spill Xplode and Norfolk Southern have done to "My Railroad". Less than 30 years later, a form of history has repeated itself.

That fellow is now an avid Penn Central modeler. He loved The Central, but the bulk of the time he had free in his life to hang around the tracks, he was looking at Penn Central and what they had done to "My Railroad".

As for the RS, I know what I saw. My wife and I used to laugh about it everytime we passed it. It was NOT Amtrak, as Amtrak has nothing running (never did, likely never will) on the Harlem Division. I'm sure somebody has photos of it, it was a fixture on the Harlem south of White Plains.

D/

Hi Dieter,
Thanks for the explanation of Communist Rail. Conrail was a bummer for me, too, because it meant no more EL or LV, but that's another story. Former PC lines in upstate NY did well under Big Blue, for the most part.

Perhaps the RS-3m you saw was owned by Metro-North?

MN Ownership - absitively.

PC trackage did better than that of the Valley for sure.

I remember riding on "The Maple Leaf" in 1975 and thinking that what it looked like under Penn Central as opposed to the last time I had seen the route under New York Central was akin to "Scorched Earth". The state of decay was shocking. I was used to seeing a well manicured ROW. At that time, the train hit spots where you lurched and swayed to the point where you thought you were leaving the tracks.

D/

This worked on the Amtrak wire train, not lightning stripes, but modified NYC paint, 1976:
http://trainspot.rrpicturearchives.net/ ... x?id=63434

The photo that Trainspot posted is along the lines of what I'm looking for. I was able to find, from variuos sources, GP-9s still in lightning stripes after the 1966 renumbering, but no evidence they were still like that on 2/1/68 or after.

By 1966/67, would the NYC have invested in repainting units that were still in lightning stripes into solid black/cigar band, knowing the merger was coming soon and units would be repainted (or at least the emblems painted or decaled over) anyway?