08-10-04 PHOTOS: Washington Union Station Centennial

Nothing beats having a date to date your photos! Anyway last Octobre was the 100th birthday of the Washington Union Terminal complex which opened its doors as a joint venture between the PRR, B&O and several other railroads. It also provided a wonderful opportunity to hang out at the station taking photos of whatever one wished without getting swarmed by security.

Amtrak really pulled out the stops for this celebration with private varnish and private horsepower showing up from all across the east coast to represent all of the fallen flag railroads that used to call at Union Station. These included preserved E-unit diesels from the C&O, Atlantic Coast Line, Southern RR and Pennsylvania railroad. In addition to the diesel units there was a plethora of private cars also representing the aforementioned railroads. Amtrak, MARC and the FRA also put out some of their own rolling stock (can you say freebie) for the public to traipse through.

The real star of the show was PRR GG-1 #4935 which was towed from the RR Museum of Pennsylvania in Strasbourg just for the event.

Because the celebration was taking place on a weekend I drove to Greenbelt and then took the metro into Union Station (Green line to Red Line via Ft Totten). Before the gates were opened I got some good short from the Union Station parking deck.

Anyway the whole stack of photos can be viewed at the somewhat usual location.

And now for some teaser photos that will be of surprisingly good quality (for once).

I'll start off with a video of my Green Line train departing Greenblt and crossing over to the proper track. The DC Metro is actually pretty railfan friendly with a reverse railfan view available on nearly every train.



I will skip past the pictures of B&O signals and cut right to a solid train of 1000 series cars on the Red Line at Ft. Totten. (As seen on Wikipedia)

A train of CSX autoracks snaked through QN Tower interlocking adjacent to the WMATA Red Line.

K tower and the entire terminal throat.

K-tower close up with an AEM-7 hauled regional is departing from the lower level while an HHP-8 hauled regional waits on one of the high level platforms.

Here is some video of the departing Regional. Pardon my zoom.



3 P42's lay over on the lower level next to a pair of AX trainsets in the Acela section of the high level.

Dwarf CPL's abound in front of K-Tower from track level.

Anyway, here is the only surviving E3 unit in its ACL sitting next to Bennett Levin's PRR E8's.

And those PRR E8's.

GG-1 #4935 sitting next to a southern painted E unit.

Here's the lineup in the MARC/Regional (Gate A) section of Union Station. From front to back Levin's PRR #120, PRR E8, ACL E3, GG-1, SOU Ex, C&O Ex.

BTW, let me know if you think this slightly darker version looks better.

Down on the exhibition platform past an AX, Marc split-level and FRA #200 inspection car Amtrak SW-1000 switcher #796 was hanging out on an adjacent track. It wasn't officially part of the show, but I think the crew parked it there for a little face time.

Also hanging out was MARC AEM-7 #4902. I do not know if this was pre or post rebuild.

Now, there was an entire fleet of private cars that were open for touring and I felt obligated to take pictures, but the lighting and angles were very poor and I really don't want to go through describing the various types of linens and dinnerware that adorned the interior as I am really not a railwayana person.

So instead of opulent furnishings from the golden days of railroading so I am just going to cut to the caboose and show a unit train of festering New York City garbage that rumbled through the Greenbelt MARC station shortly after I exited the Metro with a pair of C40-10W's, #5429 and 5292, providing power.

You know I can't think a better place for all of NYC's nasty smelly garbage than the South. Maybe with time we can turn those red states brown. XD

Alright, that's. Happy Halloween everybody!!!