Railroad thread

[Duke Andrew of Dank]

@TheMann

You said that three consists of each Amtrak long-distance train exists, right? IIRC, there was at least oen that made limited stops and one that made more stops?

 

[Duke Andrew of Dank]

As far as PRR preservation goes, I also had the idea that the three PRR L1s sold to the ATSF would survive.

 

[Duke Andrew of Dank]

Recently, I've thought of several ways the Union Pacific could try and enter St. Louis.

 

[Duke Andrew of Dank]

Now, the name trains of the Amtrak Group.

- City of Los Angeles: New York - Albany - Buffalo - Cleveland - Toledo - South Bend - Chicago - St. Louis - Kansas City - Denver - Santa Fe - Albuquerque - Belen - Flagstaff - Phoenix - Yuma - Los Angeles
- City of San Fransisco: New York - Albany - Buffalo - Cleveland - Toledo - South Bend - Chicago - St. Louis - Kansas City - Denver - Salt Lake City - Ogden - Reno - -Sacramento - Oakland - San Jose - San Fransisco
- Sunset Limited: Orlando - Jacksonville - Tallahassee - Pensacola - Mobile - New Orleans - Houston - San Antonio - El Paso - Deming - Tuscon - Phoenix - Yuma - Palm Springs - San Bernardino - Los Angeles
- American President [1]: Washington DC - Harrisburg - Pittsburgh - Columbus - Indianapolis - Chicago - Des Moines - Omaha - Denver - Salt Lake City - Reno - Sacramento - Oakland - San Jose - San Fransisco
- Broadway Limited [2]: New York - Philadelphia - Harrisburg - Pittsburgh - Canton - Lima - Ft. Wayne - Chicago
- National Limited: Washington DC - Cumberland - Pittsburgh - Columbus - Dayton - Cincinnati - Indianapolis - Terre Hautte - St. Louis - Kansas City
- New England States: Boston - Springfield - Albany - Buffalo - Cleveland - Toledo - South Bend - Chicago
- Lake Shore Limited: New York - Albany - Buffalo - Cleveland - Toledo - South Bend - Chicago
- Colonial: Bangor - Portland - Boston - Providence - New Haven - New York - Philadelphia - Baltimore - Washington DC - Richmond - Petersburg - Norfolk
- Silver Star: New York - Philadelphia - Baltimore - Washington DC - Richmond - Raleigh - Greensboro - Winston-Salem - Charlotte - Columbia - Charleston - Savannah -Jacksonville
- Palmetto: New York - Philadelphia - Baltimore - Washington DC - Richmond - Raleigh - Fayetteville - Myrtle Beach - Charleston - Savannah - Jacksonville - Orlando - Tampa
- Royal Palm: Chicago - Detroit - Columbus - Cincinnati - Knoxville - Chattanooga - Atlanta - Savannah - Jacksonville - Orlando - Miami
- Pan-American: Detroit - Columbus - Cincinnati - Louisville - Nashville - Birmingham - Jackson - New Orleans - Houston - San Antonio
- Lake Superior Limited: Chicago - Milwaukee - Madison - Twin Cities - Duluth - Superior
- Empire Builder: Chicago - Milwaukee - Madison - Twin Cities - Havre - Shelby- Spokane - Seattle
- Western Star: Chicago - Milwaukee - Madison - Twin Cities - Minot - Billings - Helena - Spokane - Portland
- Southwest Limited [3]: Chicago - St. Louis - Kansas City - Wichita - Enid - Amarillo - Tucumcari - El Paso - Deming - Tuscon - Phoenix - Yuma - Palm Springs - San Bernardino - Los Angeles - San Diego
- Great Southeast [4]: New York - Philadelphia - Baltimore - Washington DC - Richmond - Raleigh - Greensboro - Winston-Salem - Charlotte - Atlanta - Birmingham - Meridian - Jackson - New Orleans - Houston - San Antonio
- Carolinan [5]: Chicago - Indianapolis - Louisville - Nashville - Chattanooga - Knoxville - Asheville - Charlotte - Winston-Salem - Greensboro - Durham - Raleigh - Greenville - Kill Devil Hills
- Floridian [6]: Chicago - Indianapolis - Louisville - Nashville - Chattanooga - Atlanta - Savannah - Jacksonville - Orlando - Tampa
- City of New Orleans: Chicago - St. Louis - Paducah - Memphis - Jackson - New Orleans
- Lone Star: Chicago - St. Louis - Poplar Bluff - Memphis - Little Rock - Dallas - Ft. Worth - San Antonio - El Paso
- California Zephyr [7]: Chicago - Peoria - Quad Cities - Des Moines - Omaha - Denver - Salt Lake City - Reno - Sacramento - Oakland - San Jose - San Fransisco
- South Wind: Chicago - Indianapolis - Louisville - Nashville - Birmingham - Mobile - Pensacola - Tallahassee - Jacksonville - Orlando - Tampa
- Windy City: Chicago - St. Louis - Kansas City - Denver - Salt Lake City - Reno - Sacramento - Oakland - San Jose - San Fransisco
- Desert Wind: Chicago - Cedar Rapids - Omaha - Cheyenne - Denver - Salt Lake City - Las Vegas - San Bernardino - Los Angeles
- Coast Daylight: San Diego - Los Angeles - San Luis Obispo - Monterrey - San Jose - Oakland - Sacramento - Eugene - Portland - Seattle
- Mount Rainier: New Orleans - Houston - Ft. Worth - Amarillo - Trinidad - Denver -
- Texas Rocket [8]: Twin Cities - Des Moines - Kansas City - Wichita - Oklahoma City - Ft. Worth - Waco - Temple - College Station - Houston
- Twin Capitals Limited: Ottawa - Montreal - Burlington - Albany - New York - Philadelphia - Baltimore - Washington DC
- Bluegrass: Boston - New York - Philadelphia - Washington DC - Richmond - Petersburg - Lynchburg - Roanoke - Bristol - Knoxville - Chattanooga - Huntsville - Memphis - Little Rock - Texarkana - Dallas/Ft. Worth

[1] So-called because of President Reagan's role in its creation, and the fact he rode it home after his second term in 1989. ITTL, Reagan was a staunch supporter of rail transport when as Governor of California, he collaborated with the Southern Pacific to create the San Fransisco to San Diego Steel Interstate, which was adapted by many traffic heavy rail operations as he essentially "balkanized" yet at the same time expanded Amtrak.
[2] A condition for Amtrak taking over this train was that they'd keep using the PRR Ft. Wayne Division.
[3] Made in a series of deals with the ATSF that allow Amtrak to use whichever part of the former's network they deem necessary, as long as the ATSF gets to run its own trains - something the ATSF never really has trouble with since many consider the ATSF trains superior to Amtrak.
[4] This train was created when the Amtrak Group expressed a reluctance to use the Southern railroad in its entirety. Which is why the Southern still runs the Crescent today. As such, this train instead uses the Amtrak Southeast line.
[5] This train is famous because if was one of the first trains Amtrak didn't create from a pre-existing service. It's also famous because its maiden voyage on April 23, 1983, it was powered by N&W 2-6-6-4 1218 for the stint from Nashville to Charlotte.
[6] Named the Dixie Limited until 1979.
[7] Briefly renamed the California Rocket during the Reagan years because it doesn't use ex-CBQ tracks anymore.
[8] This train also has a Chicago section that links up with the main train at Des Moines after picking up passengers in Peoria, Galesburg, the Quad Cities, and Cedar Rapids.

OOC: Special thanks goes to @TheMann and @isayyo2

 

[Duke Andrew of Dank]

The Texas Rocket is a good idea, though here I'd strongly recommend doing a merger of trains, with a section from Chicago and a section from the Twin Cities, merging in Des Moines. Other than that, it's a good setup, though Amtrak's own Texas-to-Chicago trains and the ATSF's trains will end up being rivals. I presume you have a Texas HSR here, so have the trains be powered by electrics and run fast (like 100+ mph) on the HSR lines, and make sure the equipment you use is designed to suit, and make sure you have plenty of comfortable coaches in the consist for travelers not going the whole way.

I also will have Amtrak Midwest and Amtrak Texas eventually build their own lines to Oklahoma City too.

 

[martinroberts]

I wonder, what of the Boston and Maine Railroad?

 

[Duke Andrew of Dank]

I wonder, what of the Boston and Maine Railroad?

They survive by acquiring most other railroads in the state of Maine and in New England.

 

[martinroberts]

They survive by acquiring most other railroads in the state of Maine and in New England.

Good. I wonder, electrification? Also the Unions would probably want something between the cab and a possible impact.

 

[Duke Andrew of Dank]

Good. I wonder, electrification? Also the Unions would probably want something between the cab and a possible impact.

Electrification is something I envisioned for at least Boston - Portland.

 

[martinroberts]

Something like the Little Joe would be the result for the union demands for a crumple zone.

Electrification is something I envisioned for at least Boston - Portland.

 

[Duke Andrew of Dank]

@TheMann

Do your Morrison-Knudsen locos ever see service on Amtrak Midwest & Southeast in your TL. Because one thing I was thinking of could be that each Amtrak region operates a certain number of those designs of their own.

 

[Duke Andrew of Dank]

@Lucas

I was wondering if you could maybe paint some of your electrics in the DRGW Bumblebee liveries so I could have a template for said liveries.

 

[Duke Andrew of Dank]

More rail programs of TTL - only now, they're all by Pentrex:

Peoria Rails
Journey with us to central Illinois, and the city of Peoria. Known as the "Great Chicago Bypass", this city has been shown to be an effective performer in doing just that - allowing freight and goods to pass the congestion of Chicagoland. This program takes you to Peoria and surrounding areas to sample the wide variety of both trains and motive power. Starting in Peoria itself, we savor the Toledo, Peoria, & Western's line through town west to Keokuk, IA and east to Butler, IN - then we dip south to get a look at the former Illinois Terminal, which itself has since become the TP&W's Missouri Division. Likewise, we are treated to Amtrak Midwest action as the lines to Omaha and Oklahoma split from each other here. Also featured is Illinois Central, Rock Island, Erie Lackawanna, and Chessie service in Peoria, and a bit of Burlington Northern and ATSF action in nearby Galesburg.

 

[Duke Andrew of Dank]

Thought I'd take @Lucas' GE E60 model and @TheMann's idea for an SP E60 to make this - my idea for how SP E60s look by the year 1999.

 

[Virginia Liberal]

Freight or passenger loco judging by the daylight paint skem I'm guessing passenger

 

[Duke Andrew of Dank]

Freight or passenger loco judging by the daylight paint skem I'm guessing passenger

It's actually freight. It's from the late 1980s and 1990s, when the SP repainted all of its electrics into the Daylight scheme, and repainted the diesels into the Black Widow scheme. By 2004, only a handful of diesels and the GTEL engines the SP ran still used the Bloody Nose paint scheme.

 

[TheMann]

A pair of new 500-series Southern Pacific Morrison-Knudsen MK5000C locomotives rest between jobs at Redding, California, in September 1991. The "Massive Mikes", as SP crews affectionately nicknamed the Idaho-built, Sulzer-engined MK5000Cs, proved to be among SP's best heavyweight freight movers and the go-to power for SP in the San Joaquin and Sacramento Valleys and the Los Angeles Basin, even as the construction of the Newhall Division and the electrification of the Salt Lake and Shasta divisions in the 1990s bumped them from the mountain-beating roles they had been built for.

Utah Railway and Great Western Energy diesels lead a massive unit coal train south on the Denver and Rio Grande Western's Las Vegas line near Panguitch, Utah, in June 2007. Great Western Energy's giant Henderson Synthetic Fuel Plant in Henderson, Nevada, became one of the largest such plants in the country when it opened in 2005, and the huge plant singlehandedly revived the mining of low-sulfur coal in Utah in the 2000s, delivered to the plant along the DRGW both by its own trains and those owned and operated by the Utah Railway and Great Western Energy itself.

A long, snaking British Columbia Railway forest products drag heads south behind an AC4400CW and two C40-8Ms near Lillooet, British Columbia, headed for Vancouver, in July 1996. The tough grades, tortuous track and wild climate swings of this part of British Columbia ultimately led to the British Columbia Railway electrifying the line from Williams Lake to North Vancouver between 2002 and 2005, which included substantial route modifications.

A westbound Powhatan Arrow train nears its destination of Roanoke, Virginia, in May 2015. The Powhatan Arrow came as a result of the expansion of the Northeast Corridor from Washington to Norfolk via Richmond in the 1990s and 2000s, with the new the train having two sections when running east from Roanoke, splitting at Lynchburg, with one branch running to the NEC at Richmond and the other going to Washington via Charlottesville, Culpeper, Manassas and Alexandria. Diesel multiple units originally used on the services proved inadequate for demand at many times, resulting in specially-modified GE Genesis diesels, the 700 Series, being built for the purpose by GE in 2004.

A northbound Pacific Surfliner charges out of Ventura, California, in September 2005. The Pacific Surfliner, a descendant of both the Santa Fe's San Diegan and Southern Pacific's Coast Daylight, was an immensely-popular coach train before Amtrak that only got more popular with time and as the route expanded. When the building of the California High-Speed Railway in 1990s and 2000s eliminated the need for the train south of Burbank, the train was put to work as a feeder to the CAHSR, running between San Luis Obispo and Los Angeles along the coast. By 2005, the service's popularity meant that the train ran six times a day in each direction.

A Via Rail LRC train races east for Montreal at Cornwall, Ontario, in February 1980. The LRC trains by 1980 were in the midst of becoming icons in Canada, as the turbine-powered rockets, capable in service of up to 240 km/h, continued the expansion of passenger rail service its UAC TurboTrain predecessors had started, even as with fifteen years a complete high-speed rail line had taken over the St. Lawrence River Valley lines they had been created to run on - this didn't eliminate the LRCs by a long shot, as they instead went on to capably serve feeders to the high-speed lines, as well as services in British Columbia, Alberta, Northern Ontario and Nova Scotia.

 

[Virginia Liberal]

with the new the train having two sections when running east from Norfolk, splitting at Lynchburg, with one branch running to the NEC at Richmond and the other going to Washington via Charlottesville, Culpeper, Manassas and Alexandria.

I think you mean east from Roanoke cause east of Norfolk is the Atlantic Ocean. And running west from Norfolk to Lynchburg to cut back to Richmond seems odd. 😀

 

[Duke Andrew of Dank]

A pair of new 500-series Southern Pacific Morrison-Knudsen MK5000C locomotives rest between jobs at Redding, California, in September 1991. The "Massive Mikes", as SP crews affectionately nicknamed the Idaho-built, Sulzer-engined MK5000Cs, proved to be among SP's best heavyweight freight movers and the go-to power for SP in the San Joaquin and Sacramento Valleys and the Los Angeles Basin, even as the construction of the Newhall Division and the electrification of the Salt Lake and Shasta divisions in the 1990s bumped them from the mountain-beating roles they had been built for.

I really miss the old Bloody Nose scheme - most of the diesels that once wore it started being repainted into the Black Widow scheme in 1996, and the electrics had already mosly been repainted in the Daylight colors. By the time I was born, the only locomotives still wearing them were a handful of older EMD Geeps and the GTELs that the SP ran like 7000, which is today part of its heritage collection.

Utah Railway and Great Western Energy diesels lead a massive unit coal train south on the Denver and Rio Grande Western's Las Vegas line near Panguitch, Utah, in June 2007. Great Western Energy's giant Henderson Synthetic Fuel Plant in Henderson, Nevada, became one of the largest such plants in the country when it opened in 2005, and the huge plant singlehandedly revived the mining of low-sulfur coal in Utah in the 2000s, delivered to the plant along the DRGW both by its own trains and those owned and operated by the Utah Railway and Great Western Energy itself.

I see that this photo is from before the line was electrified in 2012. The Rio Grande planned to electrify the line back when they were working on electrifying the main Denver - Ogden Route, but the traffic was not considered heavy enough at the time. The growing traffic thanks to Great Western Energy would be what gave the D&RG the excuse to electrify their line starting in 2009.

A westbound Powhatan Arrow train nears its destination of Roanoke, Virginia, in May 2015. The Powhatan Arrow came as a result of the expansion of the Northeast Corridor from Washington to Norfolk via Richmond in the 1990s and 2000s, with the new the train having two sections when running east from Norfolk, splitting at Lynchburg, with one branch running to the NEC at Richmond and the other going to Washington via Charlottesville, Culpeper, Manassas and Alexandria. Diesel multiple units originally used on the services proved inadequate for demand at many times, resulting in specially-modified GE Genesis diesels, the 700 Series, being built for the purpose by GE in 2004.

This photo seems to be on the Southern railroad's main line at Lynchburg. After all, the PRR's former N&W was already electrified by 2015. Additionally, Virginia's own Transdominion Express serves the area on a more frequent basis.

A northbound Pacific Surfliner charges out of Ventura, California, in September 2005. The Pacific Surfliner, a descendant of both the Santa Fe's San Diegan and Southern Pacific's Coast Daylight, was an immensely-popular coach train before Amtrak that only got more popular with time and as the route expanded. When the building of the California High-Speed Railway in 1990s and 2000s eliminated the need for the train south of Burbank, the train was put to work as a feeder to the CAHSR, running between San Luis Obispo and Los Angeles along the coast. By 2005, the service's popularity meant that the train ran six times a day in each direction.

I actually remember that they're thinking of expanding the train back to the original San Fransisco - San Diego route it once ran on. In part because of the relative lack of rail service between San Luis Opisbo and San Fransisco. Amtrak California's signature orange and silver trains run parallel to the Southern Pacific's San Diego line, which is why it'll stop in LA now if it's ever re-extended.

 

[TheMann]

I think you mean east from Roanoke cause east of Norfolk is the Atlantic Ocean. And running west from Norfolk to Lynchburg to cut back to Richmond seems odd. 😀

You are correct, and I edited the post. Thanks for the point out. 🙂