Way back in 2006 a friend encouraged me to post my rail photos essays and other thoughts on a service a little less ad hoc than a rapid transit forum with 1990's web design. Social media was still in its infancy and Live Journal was a pretty happening community where I could post not only my rail essays, but other thoughts and photos ( Read more... )

I'll admit that the main subject of today's photo set is more boat than train, but since like most rail stuff I like the Battleship New Jersey was built in the 1940's and I took rail transit to get there I'm posting the photos in my main sequence instead of an OT aside.

Thanks to Groupon I was lured back to take another Battleship New Jersey tour ( Read more... )

The Rebel Yell is a section of the Baltimore Light Rail line where it transitions from street running along Howard Street to the Northern Central right of way. The term, used by local fans and employees, is a reference to a wooden racing roller coaster in Kings Dominion park in Virginia, due to the undulating profile of the light rail line as it ( Read more... )

This summer I had the opportunity to take a road trip to Pittsburgh and as usual I was able to convince my ride to throw in some railfan stops along the way. These consisted of a number of locations along the former PRR Main Line / Conrail Pittsburgh Line as well as some stops in downtown Pittsburgh. This was my first visit back to Pittsburgh ( Read more... )

When Conrail was forcibly removed from the commuter rail business by Ronald Regan in 1983 the result in most places was a clean divestment of hundreds of track miles with no practical value to a freight railroads. However in a small handful of locations, main line freight operations continued to share track with full service commuter rail lines. ( Read more... )

Derived from the Latin root "Chester" meaning castle, the pronunciation of Worcester has been twisted over time from Wor-chester into Wor-cester, Wooster, Woostah and finally, it's current pronunciation, Gritty Old Mill Town. Located about an hour east of Boston, Worcester used to be a center of new Englande industry, pumping out both textiles and ( Read more... )

Well, we have come to the end of my 2015 Amtrak Transcontinental trip. After the stop in Houston all that was left was a run along the gulf coast to New Orleans, with a scheduled arrival of 9pm. Due to costs and other considerations I choose to forgo continuing the trip onto the Crescent.

Again the private car on the rear of Train 2 drastically ( Read more... )

Last we left my 2015 Amtrak Transcontinental Trip, my Sunset Limited trainset was rolling across the West Texas scrub land at a speed comparable with the posted limit on the parallel US Route 90. Upon waking the next morning, I discovered the train to be sitting at San Antonio, where cars had been cut off for the Texas Eagle to Chicago. This is the ( Read more... )

On my cross country Amtrak Trip via the Sunset Limited my train had already reached Texas, yet it was only about halfway through its journey. It was after noon when my train pulled out of El Paso heading east towards San Antonia. The great double track main line was replaced by a single track with passing sidings on the former SP Valentine Sub. ( Read more... )

Over the past 5 years my annual cross country Amtrak trek has resulted in large, often multi-part posts with 30 or so photos each. Well, as I alluded to in last week's post, this year's trip was ruined by Dan Akroyd parking his private car on the back of the train for the entire journey. I tried to salvage things as best I could, but I am going ( Read more... )