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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 railyard, 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
" 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
I remember the RS-1's floating around on the SOO but I was a little to young to have shot any. This view of 353 switching at Stevens Point on September 10, 1966 represented pretty much what the did in there later years, yard work and local service. Early on before the merger the DSS&A used there RS-1's on the passenger trains and also in switching service. Catching a back to back pair wasn't uncommon on the St- Ignace-Marquette freight although it generally was assigned Baldwins. Most likely a Joe Stauber shot, Chuck Schwesinger collection.
A Conrail local freight powered by Erie Lackawanna SW9 447 does some switching work at the junction of the Northern Branch and the Piermont Branch at Sparkill, New York, USA, 2 June 1977.
February 13, 2011: A mine run switches dolomite hoppers in the storage tracks at Riverview (Tacoma), Virginia on the the N&W Clinch Valley District.
New MK Rail Liquid Natural Gas (LNG) powered MK1200G switch engines pause in Salt Lake City Utah during transit to the Santa Fe Railway in Los Angeles, California on October. 29, 1994.
ATSF 1201 was built from the frame of C&O GP9 No. 6149. The 1200 and 1201 served for two decades in the Los Angeles area until retirement and disposition.
Click to enlarge
Credits:
Hair - Doux Bertha @ Aqua (Open Now)
Face Piercing - SU Piercing Set 4 @ The Chapter 4 (Open Now)
Tattoo - Bolson Mr Burton
Top - Ricielli Charlie Lace Top Black @ The Chapter 4
Jacket - Scandalize Annie Black
Pants - Villena Distressed Pants Black
Shoes - Reign Sweet Bliss Heels @ Collabor88 (Open Now)
Head - Catwa Lona
Eyebrows - Bossie Autumn Eyebrows
Eyes - SU The Dark Eyes
Skin - Deetalez - Head Taylor
Pose - Vilda Melody 1
After switching at the east end of town for a while the 9011 and 9014 shove into the west end of the yard to start the remainder of their work before shoving into the clear for the Maine Northern to pass by. What was supposed to be a short wait for the Maine Northern would turn out to be over a 2 hour wait which gave me a lot of time to do some time exposures and chat with the crew.
From left to right, in the cab, Carl Spencer, outsdie, Bruce Sharpe, Jimmy Doliver, Frank Eldred, and Jim Dundon, engineer, have the Conrail Norwich local heading north through Norwich, NY on a hot summer day. The ground crew get to enjoy the 10 mph breeze on the rear of the ex Erie Lackawanna EMD SW unit all the way up to Woods Corners where they'll switch I.L. Richer Feed.
Maine Switching Services shoves a long cut of boxcars into ND Paper as the late afternoon light shines down. On a visit 9 days later, the mill would be shut tight with not a peep of movement, the start of an "extended shutdown" that may likely extend infinitely. At this point, the switcher has gone west and Old Town yard is used mainly for car storage.
We started MLK Day 2020 at Canton, expecting to follow the daily Canton to Asheville turn on the Blue Ridge Southern. Unfortunately, they weren't running on their normal schedule that morning, but we stumbled into a local on the western end of the railroad with two old D&H GP39-2s for power. Blue Ridge Southern train T59 switches out Giles Chemical in Waynesville, NC.
Iowa Traction Railway steeple cabs Nos. 60 and 51 switch the yard at Emery on the west side of Mason City, Iowa, on April 15, 2008. IATR No. 60 was built by Baldwin-Westinghouse originally for Youngstown & Ohio, while No. 51 originally worked for Northeastern Oklahoma Railway. No. 60 is 100 years old in 2017, while sister No. 51 is four years younger—both providing 196 years of rail service!
The Niles Train Museum.
Night, full moon, one minute exposure, sodium and mercury vapor lights, blue and red-gelled strobe flash.
SERA 2679 and 2612 pull out a long cut of LPG tanks from the siding in Warnerville, bound for Standard and the propane eventually bound for homes in and around Sonora. The hill job extra, being these 2 units, would pull 5 of the cars along with a empty centerbeam up to Standard. They would switch everything in Standard with anticipation that the regular hill would take 2 loaded centerbeams and 3 tanks from Standard back down the hill. The extra would tie up for the night, most likely heading down with the yet to be unloaded tanks and 2 centerbeams.
12/30/21
At the south end of UP's Settegast Yard in Houston, a pair of Geeps shove back as they drill the large, former MP yard.
YHO82R 04
UP GP38-2 #674
UP GP60 #1167
Houston, TX
October 4th, 2024
BNSF local R-PWR4011, the Golden Switch, returns to Golden Yard with Burlington Northern painted GP39E (GP30) 2745 leading.
Former B&M GP9 1741 begins to make up its train for the day at the North Conway Depot on the Conway Scenic Railroad. 1741 was just restored to service, thanks to the 470 Railroad Club. 1741 will lead the annual 470 Excursion to Conway before being added onto the west end of the train to join F7s 4266 and 4268 for the climb up the mountain to Fabyan's. As hinted by the old telephone box, we're in B&M territory, and this train will be operating on the former Boston and Maine Conway Branch. There's no better power than the 3 historic B&M locomotives that will be used today.
Having completed their 28 mile trip from the mainline in Poteau, OK the Fort Smith Dodger (train RHV106 03) is seen working in their historic original Kansas City Southern Yard in the town that gives them their name.
While their are a few smaller customers they switch and they do handle a bit of interchange with both shortlines in town, the Arkansas and Missouri and Fort Smith Railroad's, their main reason for continued existence is to serve the OK Foods feed mill on the edge of downtown. I was astonished to find that the 10 story tall grain towers were decorated with three truly stunning portraits. Fort Smith has a surprisingly vibrant downtown full of historic sites, good restaurants, and public art but few art pieces can compare to this. Sponsored by the company and painted over only the span of two weeks back in 2016 by Australian visual artist Guido van Helten they are inspiring pieces worthy of reflection. To learn more check out this article: www.swtimes.com/news/20160919/guido-van-helten-transforms...
Here is one of the countless angles I captured of the pair of KCS GP40-2s switching beneath it.
And if you missed it and want to learn a bit more about this line check out the caption with my first post of this chase: flic.kr/p/2mmgpqZ
Fort Smith, Arkansas
Friday September 3, 2021
MRL's 840 local switches Logan before returning to Helena with the only operating MRL SD45 on the roster.
The crew of L506 uses a pair of GP40-2W's to switch the yard at Roma Junction Alberta. The road power for the next day's southbound sits in the yard just to the left of the conductor
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
Progressive Rail leased switcher CIT 1101 at Faribault, Minnesota, June 2, 2023. The unit switches former CGW and Milw Road industries in town. Photo by Joe McMillan.
© Seb Alessandroni | All rights reserved.
All photos they may not be used or reproduced without my permission. If you would like to use one of my images for commercial purposes or other reason, please contact me. Depending on the situation may have to assign the work as specified by the author.
NYSW WS-2 switching out cars in MC before heading west towards PC and beyond to work industries around the area. SD40-2 #3022, a former Southern “High Hood” SD40-2 has the honors for the night.
The crew of Montana Rail Link’s weekend train down the Bitterroot Branch, formerly known as the Darby Branch, switches their train together at Missoula, Montana, on a rainy May 18, 2013.
Our Daily Challenge-Light Switch
This is the night-light I use and the light switch for above the sink.
Maine Northern Railway Train 521-11 switches LaJoie Growers on 4/11/2025.
LaJoie runs a warehouse here which loads and unloads products for the Twin Rivers Paper mill in Madawaska, since there isn't a whole lot of room at the mill. In addition to this LaJoie takes cars of fertilizer for local potato farms, in addition to shipping occasional loads of potatoes.
Behind me is the large Irving lumber transload, which can load 10-11 cars at a time with lumber from various mills in New Brunswick.
Once done working the US side, 521 will normally work the Irving mill across the river in Saint-Leonard, NB as well as dropping interchange traffic with CN. However on this day they didn't end up switching the mill.
At one point tracks continued south from here to Stockholm, where the line split with one leg going to Caribou and the other to Mapleton. The trackage from Caribou to Van Buren was pulled during the BAR's downsizing in the late 60-80's, while the Mapleton-Stockholm line survived for a few more years. After large plots of land were sold by the paper companies, the BAR got rid of the Mapleton-Stockholm portion after the loss of logs going to the paper mills.
A few customers remained in Van Buren until sometime in the 90's. Around 15-20 years ago, US Customs and Border Protection bought the remaining track running into downtown, to allow for a new border crossing to be built on the former right of way. Today the line dead ends around a mile south of this point.
Maine Northern Railway
Train: 521-11
4/11/2025
Van Buren, ME
MNR Van Buren Yard
I thought this shot could look like something else going on a few decades ago. The Illinois Railway Museum diesel crew was using CNW F7 411 as Museum switcher on Sunday 3/12/23. Among the switch moves was to pull out GTW RS1 1951. This veteran ALCO hasn’t been outside in some time.
With the first snow of the season finally sticking I went out trackside close to home to shoot the Seaview Transportation working down in Quonset-Davisville. After digging out cars at Ocean State Yard over on the Davisville Branch half of the railroad they headed over to the Quonset side and assembled their train in the new Mill Creek Yard before continuing east down the line to work mainstay customer, Toray Plastics.
Here they are working out across Roger Williams Ave. as they pull and spot the five stub ended tracks inside the facility. As described by their own web site: 'Founded in 1985, Toray Plastics (America), Inc., is a leading innovator in polypropylene, polyester, and polyolefin technology and operates three state-of-the-art facilities. Our headquarters in North Kingstown, Rhode Island, is home to two facilities. There we manufacture cast and mono- and biaxially-oriented polypropylene film, biaxially-oriented polyester film, and bio-based films, and conduct in-house metallizing and coating. Our films are used for industrial, packaging, lidding, graphic, optical, and electronic applications.'
Parent company Toray Industries is headquartered in Tokyo and was founded in 1926 as a Rayon Yarn Production Company. Today, it operates in 29 countries and has over 48, 000 employees globally and is the world's largest producer of carbon fiber among a vast array of other modern industrial products.
SVTX GP10 1855 was built as a GP9 in Aug. 1956 for the Baltimore and Ohio as their #6467. Later rebuilt by ICG's Paducah Shop she bounced around on different shortlines until coming to Rhode Island in 2006 where she was given this snappy paint job.
To learn more about this railroad check out the longer caption with this shot: flic.kr/p/2nNXfxP
North Kingstown, Rhode Island
Monday December 12, 2022
Leased, or even owned, by the Texas & Oklahoma RR, this "GN" (originally Frisco) MP15DC switcher rests just north of I-20. October 2020.