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Doug Harrop Photography • September 30, 1974
A clean Southern Pacific Alco S-6 shuffles Amtrak power in Oakland, California. A grand total of 126 S-6 (DL 430) models were built by Alco in Schenectady, New York between May 1955 and December 1960. SP acquired far more than any other railroad with 70 of them.
Mortal kings are ruling castles
Welcome to my world of fun
Liars settle into sockets
Flip the switch and watch them run
A Reading & Northern "Work Extra" has just made interchange with the PICW at Penobscot, PA, and are blasting south on the main. The two "pups" in the yard are arranging the locomotives and freight cars for the run to the Creawood Industrial.
God Bless The R&N
CSXT 2012 pulls empties at Kraft Heinz in Jax, FL on a smoggy evening, likely from a nearby wildfire, a pretty routine occurrence around the swampy regions here in North Florida and South Georgia. Notable here is the SP boxcar with dreadnaught ends that the conductor would spot in place of the RBOX; extremely few still remain in service in 2025 with basically zero making it to Florida these days. One more 50' car with dreadnaught ends made it to Heinz a few months later, but like the one here it wasn't pulled or placed until nighttime. Unfortunately the conductor first had to switch the tanks around and by the time the loads were spotted it was well past dark in this case, leaving this as the only photo of the classic car getting switched. The car, SP 656253, was built in November 1976 by Pacific Car & Foundry, leaving only about a year left for its service life, if it makes it that long. Interestingly, this exact car number has an N-scale model; here it hauled tomato paste for ketchup production from California to Jacksonville, FL.
Ex Canadian National GP9rm now working for Carolina Coastal pulls cars from the yard at Perdue. It will couple to the other GP9 and head to Rocky Mount with the interchange traffic.
Switching action on the Indiana Harbor Belt: RP15BDF 1514 shoves a long string of cars into the west end of Blue Island Yard, while SW1500 waits to pull out across the CSX diamonds at CP Harvey for headroom.
After photographing the last trains of the day on the Lahntal I went back by bike along the river to check if the switcher at the Schaefer Kalkwerk was shootable.Sure enough they were still loading their train and thanks to the flip screen on my new camera I could get some shots holding the camera over my head. V60 261 841-1, numbered as HABA7, for its old owner Stadtwerke Osnabrück is one of 5 locos on the property, but I think only two are operational. The line to Schaeffer Kalk is the only remaining portion the former meter gauge Kerkerbachbahn, which otherwise ceased operations in 1960. This place reminds me a bit of Crab Orchard, Tennessee, a limestone plant along a busy road on the remnants of a local shortline. Unfortunately missing are the highhood GEs and huge trestles.....
Nerdy Light Switches. Embrace your inner geek with theses decorative wall switches. Coming to the 7event this Feb maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Cyldane%20Mall/208/214/3097
On April 7, 2008, SMS SW1200RS #1337 leaves Delanson, NY with a one-car train for Guilderland. Scanned from a Fujichrome Provia 100F slide.
With a late afternoon snow storm with 6 inchs of snow that ended Friday night the switchs are keeping warm with fire at Jct Tower A-2
Montana Rail Link Train 844-19 switches the Graymont facility at Townsend on 10/19/2022.
Lime is mined and produced at a mine to the west of here, which is then trucked and transloaded onto rail cars here.
I was lucky to catch the 109 leading, since it had been out of service for most of my trip and went down again not long after.
Montana Rail Link
Train: 840-19 (Helena Local)
10/19/2022
Townsend, Montana
MRL 2nd Subdivision
In Palmer, MA, a pair of former Canadian National wide cab GP40s work as the New England Central Palmer switcher on Friday, January 24, 2025. The second locomotive wears a special paint scheme honoring veterans.
323210 rolls into Four Oaks with 2O45 Lichfield Trent Valley High Level to Bromsgrove with the former platform lighting control switch taking centre stage removed and rusted up it's certainly switched out.
2021 represents a significant milestone in the history of the Phoenix Railway-Photographic Circle with the celebration of our 50th anniversary. Phoenix was set up in spring 1971 and was created to promote an alternative approach to railway photography. Why not take a look at the PRPC web site at www.phoenix-rpc.co.uk/index.html.
SMS SW1200 #104 has paused its switching duties in Fort Edward, NY as the covered hopper on the headpin gets transloaded to a truck.
SMS Rail Services
Fort Edward, NY
April 27, 2026
CSXT MP15AC 1189 pulls a set of tanks from Heinz Portion Control in Jacksonville, FL. The 1189 is one of only a handful of MP15s remaining on the CSX roster and is likely only left because of it's remote control capability. Heinz makes small sauce packets here and receives corn syrup and other oils and tomato paste by rail. The remote operator would set out an empty tank, replace it with a load and also spot a loaded boxcar of tomato paste, which gets tucked away at the farthest spot on the spur where the only unloading door is located.
We find ourselves at Lang Yard for "Toledo Tuesday", which was the south end of the only 48 mile long D&TSL mainline. The GTW wanted access to Toledo, and likewise the NKP wanted access to Detroit, both cities being heavily industrialized areas not accessed directly by either of those major roads. Hence, the D&TSL, was owned 50% by each of those two railroads. The D&TSL might have seemed like a small operation, but given the industrial end points, they became a very busy, even double tracked mainline by 1903. Even the location of #41 in this photo, Lang Yard in Toledo, was soon built out to be a hump yard, and was home to double headed switchers working the hump.
Into the diesel era, D&TSL operated all this with only 10 of these GP-7 diesels, along with 6 EMD switchers. This was possible only because the parents roads, mostly the GTW, often provided pool power to handle the Shore Line's mainline traffic. In 1981, the N&W which had long since merged itself into having other routes to Detroit (mainly the ex-Wabash), sold their 50% share to the GTW. Now under full control of the GTW, the Shore Line was unfortunately rapidly fully absorbed by the GTW.
The nose of a Wheeling & Lake Erie GP35 shines off the end of a relatively new tank car at Rook Yard in Green Tree.
TRC 2008 switches out some cars at the massive facility in Trona, CA. While generally inaccessible to the public, the Trona Road grade crossing offered this view of a switch crew that pulled up just far enough to be photographed.
A late running 6M31 09:53 Hunslet Tilcon Sdgs - Arcow Quarry hauled by GBRf 60087 “Ingleborough” passes Switchers Farm near Otterburn, on approach to Hellifield.
Having departed Hunslet some 100+ minutes behind schedule, it was down to 67 late passing Shipley however, on approaching Skipton it got routed into the loop, despite nothing needing to overtake, after an anxious wait, 6M31 got the route north passing the camera around 92 late, probably a blessing in disguise being late.
January 2025.
Otter Tail Valley's local makes the usual stop on the way back to Fergus in S Moorhead. They have 3 customers on this short branch and two are being serviced today. The last car is a load of lumber for Sprenger and the other two centerbeams are for Drywall Supply.
It was a quick switching stop today, but sometimes they can work this branch for as long as three hours. If you see the local leave Dilworth with 10+ loaded centerbeams and nothing is sorted, that's your answer on switching time.
One of two MP15's left on the roster, Belt Railway of Chicago 150 works Charter Steel on Chicago's extreme West side.
Chicago, IL
2022.03.05
Union Pacific SD45 No. 3637 performs a 'flying switch' in Provo, Utah on July 3, 1977. Merriam-Webster defines this as 'a maneuver in which one or more railroad cars are disconnected from a locomotive while moving and as the locomotive pulls away are switched to another track to roll to a desired position under their own momentum.'
Mass Coastal 2008 is seen at Maritime Terminal Inc. switching out a reefer car in busy New Bedford, MA.
Tuesday, April 13, 2021
NR43 and NR30 tackle the gradient at Coolalie with ease, working a late running 3PS7 to Sydney.
Friday 2nd May 2025
Arkansas and Missouri train SFLO is doing a bit of switching at the siding known as Johnson Switch ad they work their way south from Springdale to Fayetteville. This job was on duty at 11 AM with a pair of classic Alco C420s, numbers 56 and 57 both built for the Lehigh and Hudson River Railroad in Dec. 1965 as their numbers 25 and 26 respectively. They are seen here working just north of the Main Street crossing near MP 347.7 (measured from the Frisco's historic corporate headquarters city of St. Louis) in this once small down that is now a suburb of booming Fayetteville.
To learn more check out the long caption with this shot: flic.kr/p/2mmJMoD
Johnson, Arkansas
Thursday September 2, 2021
A trio of EMD standard cabs sits at the interchange between UP and Kennecott Utah Copper, located at Garfield west of Salt Lake City. All switching at the copper smelter and refinery in Garfield is contracted out to RailServe, hence the RSSX locomotives here.
GMTX GP38-2 #2662
RSSX GP9u #1590
RSSX GP7 #116
Garfield, UT
April 24th, 2023
MRL's Helena Local switches hoppers at the Graymont lime facility in Townsend on the 2nd Sub.
MRL 840 Local (Helena Local)
MRL GP9 #109
MRL SD40-2XR #252
Townsend, MT
May 4th, 2022
For this switcher Sunday, we're in Tulsa Oklahoma on May 22, 1980 and see an SW7 drilling the rear end of a freight that had come into Cherokee Yard from the east. This was a quick stop over for me on the way home from a year long work assignment in Texas. I was anxious to get home but Tulsa deserved a lot more time. Sadly, I've not been back.
Duluth & Northeastern 14 is on switching duty the railroad's base town of Cloquet, MN. 14 is now owned by the Sierra Railroad, acquired in 2022 from the now defunct Filmore and Western Railway.
9-21-1963
Photographer Unknown - Jacob Narup Collection
" Lets get the drill on P&H 1 lined for the naught..The yard job on P&H 2 for the Waverly runner ...and I got a transfer job from the Garden waiting to come off the NY BAY Line spur ..and he's on SHORT TIME......"
WA5 in the good ole days on a Saturday morning ..a switch tenders nightmare
Newark NJ WA5 P&H Branch/Greenville Branch CR
Standard Steel SW8 6734 switches inside the massive plant. Still wearing her North Shore colors from where she was purchased in 2014, she was built in Sept. 1951 as Lehigh Valley Railroad 265.
Standard Steel is the only reason the Juniata Valley Railroad still operates the four miles of the old PRR Milroy Branch up from Lewistown and down Water Street featured earlier.
Standard Steel has been in existence since 1795, one of the longest continuously operating forging operations in the United States. The company, initially known as Freedom Forge, was founded during the first term of President George Washington. Initially, the plant produced iron bars and rods though today it solely produces railcar wheels and axles mostly for the freight new build market (though it does sell into the aftermarket and makes passenger wheels as well). Once known as one of the largest producers of steam locomotive tires, by the start of WWII it was producing 1/5th of the all locomotive tires used in the US. Here is a nice one page corporate timeline: www.standardsteel.com/history.php
And for a more in depth article on the saving and resurgence of the 250 acre plant that employs 600 people check out this article: industrytoday.com/the-right-track/
Burnham, Pennsylvania
Friday July 31, 2020
C&NW SD40-2 6847, built in March 1974, idles in Union on a partially cloudy May afternoon. The crew breifly discusses what their plan is to pull the locomotives in tow out of the shop and to move C&NW 6847 onto a seperate track. Today's plan was to get CB&Q SD24 504 out of the shop to use the outdoor crane to replace the radiator, and C&NW 6847 was the designated shop switcher for the day. While this may look like a scene straight out of a 1980s Chicago and North Western rail yard, in reality C&NW 6847 is currently owned and operated by the Illinois Railway Museum and was switching power around the Diesel Locomotive Restoration Shop.
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Illinois Railway Museum
Union, Illinois, USA
May 24, 2025
Canon EOS 60D
Canon EF-S 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 IS