13-03-10 PHOTOS: Baltimore Light Rail and Martin Airport

Have a double feature today due to two rather short photo sets taken in the Baltimore area. The first contains a number of Light Rail photos taken around the Mt Royal Station and Camden Station areas. The second features the increasingly popular Martin State Airport station which allows one to get rather up close and personal with high speed Amtrak trains north of the city as well as various aircraft operated by the Maryland Air Guard.

We begin with the Penn Station shuttle pulling in to the Mt Royal station en-route to Penn Station with LRV #5048.

Hunt Valley train with LRV #5047 heads north through the flat junction north of the station after punching in the route following the Penn Station train which headed right.

Southbound Cromwell train arriving at Mt Royal.

Two car Light Rail train flying over Bailey's Wye.

LRV #5029 also flying over the north leg of the wye.

Penn Station shuttle laying over on the center track at Camden Yards while it is passed by a BWI train heading southbound.

Hunt valley train also being throw into the mix for a three-way-meet.

Speaking of Hunt Valley here is #5038 at the northern terminus of the line on a somewhat rainy day.

Three-car light rail train at Woodbury. Note how the grade crossing there has a delayed closing to allow the train to make its stop without delaying motorists. The Woodbury area has become heavily gentrified in recent years.


CSX C40-9W #9037 and C40-8 #7558 power up the grade eastbound out of downtown Baltimore and through the St Paul St tunnel on the Baltimore Terminal Subdivision with a long string of autoracks in tow.


Southbound Amtrak AX Power Car #2004 passing under the 835 automatic signals at Martin Airport.

Video of the same train passing the Martin Airport station at 125mph.



The Martin Airport station is located at Milepost 84 on the Main Line between Philadelphia and Washington and serves both peak direction riders to Baltimore and Washington as well as reverse peak riders to area industry such as the large Lockheed Martin plant. It consists of three small "duckboard" type platforms that stretch out across up to three NEC tracks that are long enough to serve the door areas of 4 adjacent cars.

The duckboards provide great views of the NEC and the flexibility to platform across up to three high speed tracks for only the cost of a couple hundred dollars in materials from Home Depot. This is the sort of cost effective station construction that the ADA has generally rendered impossible. It's also a good place to record those "camera in trackbed" type videos as the duckboards can shield the camera from flying debris and wind blast. 

The minimalist station design extends to the passenger shelters.

Amtrak AEM-7 #916 with a Silver Service LD train passing the station at 110mph.



Northbound MARC HHP-8 #4912 with 7 heavy bi-level cars in tow puts put some brake shoe smoke as it dumps speed to make its scheduled ~5:30 stop at the Martin Airport station.



If you were wondering what that buzzing noise was it was a C-27J Spartan spinning up one of its two turboprop engines at the MD Air Guard base across the road from the station.

Crew getting ready to signal the engineer to depart Martin Airport. This train will continue on to Perryville, but MARC recently expanded service to Martin Airport itself building a small yard next to its Penn Line maintenance facility a few hundred yards north of the station. Trains terminating at Martin Airport will pull past the station on 'A' Track and then open a hand throw switch into the yard.

Bi-level cab car #7845 on the rear of the MARC commuter train.

Amtrak Regional with AEM-7 #910 headed southbound through Martin Airport.

Next week we will head back to the California Zephyr for some special photos taken by my Second Unit.