For the past decade, HARRIS tower has been my first choice of rail related museums due to its unique content, close proximity and interactivity. However in recent years its available was first hampered by a general restoration of the Union Switch and Signal Model 14 interlocking machine and then the COVID 19 pandemic that made hanging out in close quarters with its largely senior citizen staff somewhat problematic. However come the summer of 2021 vaccines were available and the machine was back up and running so, not wanting to waste time, I booked an early trip up to Harrisburg in advance of my annual fall visit. You can check out all the typical Amtrak and Norfolk Southern photos here ( mirror ).
When I arrives an Amtrak Keystone trainset with ACS-86 #668 and Metroliner Cab Car #9643 was performing a relay move through Amtrak's HARRIS interlocking all while NS ET44AC #3626 was waiting on the Royalton Branch with a train of empty coal hoppers while higher priority intermodal traffic passed by.
The first of these was a westbound train of doublestacks with nearly brand new NS AC44C6M rebuild #4471 leading and C40-10W #7565 and older AC44C6M rebuild #4246 behind.
It wasn't long before eastbound Amtrak Pennsylvanian Train #42 arrived with P42DC #121 leading.
Here is the third post documenting my 20201 Amtrak Train 79/19/20 round trip to Gainesville, GA. In part one I covered the southbound trip on Train 79 and its associated limited time only reverse railfan view. This part includes the stuff I encountered in Georgia as well as beginning and end of the trip around Washington Union Station. Since I moved out of Baltimore City, I now have to catch Amtrak Southern Service trains in Washington they tend not to make make BWI stops. This time I used the layover period to get photos of the Washington Union Station terminal action from both the parking deck before my southbound trip and a lower level platform after my northbound trip. You can find the full set of photos here ( mirror ).
Waiting at BWI for my southbound MARC train to DC, I caught a northbound Regional with ACS-86 #655 and some water dumping from the Cafe car.
Getting off at Union Station I was treated to a little Mars Light action by MARC Kab Kar #7849.
From the parking deck one could see how much development was closing in on the Washington Terminal right of way. Compare with similar views from 2008 and 2014.
The MARC yard had a medley of equipment including MARC SC44 #86, MP36PH-3C #25 and Kawasaki Kab Kar #7850.
The parking deck provides a great view of the entire K TOWER area including Amtrak ACS-86 #664 and P42DC #15 participating in a power change operation, DC Streetcar #201B at its Union Station terminus and DC Metro 3k series car #3118 in an unpainted appearance scheme.
MARC GP39H-2 #74 trundled light from the H bridge into track 9.
My upcoming Train 79 trainset then appeared, hauled by ACS-86 #611.
This was followed by a whole raft of movements including a Regional set pushed by everyone's favorite critter SW1200 #796, A MARC trainset with MP36PH-3C #31 and an Acela Express trainset led by power car #2015.
In 2015 Amtrak reversed the orientation of most of its Eastern long distance trainsets, placing the baggage car on the rear and blocking the view out the back of the train. This ruined much of the utility of Amtrak's LD service, limiting photo opportunities to the extended station stops at crew change locations. Up through 2015 I had undertaken a twice yearly journey via Trains 79, 19 and 20 to visit a friend near Gainesville, GA, but since then I had only made the trip one additional time in 2018 with no rear view so I wasn't expecting much on this journey. However I was shocked to find that due to Covid related staff shortages baggage services were temporarily suspended on Train 79/80 allowing for an old school style rear window survey and video documentation of the former RF&P Main Line, CSX A-Line and former Southern H line too the way to Greensboro. You can find all of the still photos here ( mirror ) along with a separate video post here.
Upon departing Washington Union Station via the First Street tunnels we passed a VRE trainset in the new CP-VIRGINIA storage track with MP36PH-3C #V55.
Approaching the Long Bridge we passed the northbound Lynchburg Regional Train 174 with P42DC #180.
Passing Milepost 107 on the former RF&P Main Line, construction on the new Potomac Yards WMATA station could be seen in the background.
Passing by Marine Base Quantico the future third track was laid, but not in service. This segment of the third track extends to ARKENDALE interlocking near milepost 71.
Amtrak Regional Train 94 and CSX ES44AC #916 as distributed power south of Fredericksburg.
The new VRE Spotsylvania station and CROSSROADS interlocking. Not in service for several years, this station extends the VRE Fredericksburg Line several miles south to the location of the storage yard.
The Ashland, VA station having recently benefited from a platform refresh.
Amtrak P42DC #133, seen here at Richmond, was leading my Train 79.
CSX AC4400 #327 leading a Herzog stone train on the Richmond Belt Line.
It's time once again for my yearly Amtrak round trip to Gainesville, Georgia and back. This used to be a super fun activity where I was closely collecting a high quality library of rear-facing still photos and video of the CSX RF&P Sub, CSX A-Line, former Southern H-Line and former Southern Main Line. Unfortunately in 2015 Amtrak decided to reverse its trainsets, placing the baggage car on the rear and blocking off the view. This was especially galling because I had collected video of the entire RF&P Sub, but the segment from Alexandria to Quantico had suffered from an audio failure. Well, as luck would have it, in 2021 Amtrak was having some staffing and equipment issues related to Covid and pulled the baggage car off of their Carolinian service restoring the rear facing view and I was able to collect enough video for its own special video post.
We begin with the aforementioned rear view from the back of Amtrak Train 79 as it runs from the Alexandria, VA Amtrak station to the Quantico, VA Amtrak station on the former RF&P Main Line. This was taken with my GoPro affixed to the rear vestibule window and replaces a previous video taken in 2015 that suffered from an audio problem. Note some of the preparation work for the third track, which I believe had already started back in 2015, is finally nearing completion.
Here we have a short video clip from the rear of Train 79 as it passes over the diamond crossing
at Doswell, VA on track #2 in the southbound direction. Note the
surviving RF&P bracket mast and HN interlocking tower.
Departing Richmond I wasn't careful enough and I got busted by the Richmond-Raleigh crew regarding my GoPro so I had to settle for stills. However I did steal this clip of Train 79 on track #1 overtaking a CSX
hauled Hergoz stone train on track #2 on the James River Bridge. The CSX train is led by a pair of AC4400's with
#327 in the lead.
The more things change the more they stay the same. After tens of
millions in capacity upgrades north of the Rocky Mount, NC station to
prevent this very situation, my Train 79 had to pull in and then back out of the second main track to allow
Train 90, the northbound Palmetto to pass.
Heat restrictions on CSX had both trains running late and due to a
variety of circumstances there was no ability for the two trains to pass
properly as a CSX local was blocking the new second main track to the south. The same thing happened to me in 2010 at the old BATTLE interlocking located about a mile to the south of where this video was taken. The only
difference was that the re-signaling effort now allowed a Restricting
indication to be displayed immediately after Train 90's passage. In
2010 the old Seaboard signals could only display Stop, Limited Approach
and Limited Clear.
Total delay was only about 5 minutes for my Train 79. P42DC on Train 90 appears to be #11 or #17.
With the new crew on at Raleigh I was back in business so here is a rear facing video from the CSX / Seaboard S-Line from a little past the new station at Raleigh, NC to Fetner Jct, just short of the station stop at Cary, NC. The video is cut due to need to wait for an eastbound Piedmont Service train that got to Cary ahead of us. This section of track is shared with Amtrak's Silver Star train to Florida which stay on the S-Line at Cary.
In this video we have a rear view of the former Southern H-Line from a little past the stop at Cary, NC to Durham, NC. This segment includes the section between CLEGG and NELSON interlockings that was recently re-graded to improve speeds and eliminate grade crossings. Also included is D&S Jct, the main NS yard in the Durham area and junction with the former Southern D-Line.
Finally we have some nice 80mph speeds as my train runs from a little past the stop at Burlington, NC to Greensboro, NC. I was getting off at Greensboro for an eventual transfer to Train 19, the southbound Crescent.
I will finish this post off with a video of my slightly late Train #79 led by P42DC #133 as it suddenly has some company in the form of a southbound NS double stack intermodal train being hauled by AC44C6M #4059, SD70ACe #1178 and C44-10W #7570. With both trains whistling for the Elm St crossing, Train 79 takes the lead despite being hobbled by a Diverging Clear signal indication at POMONA interlocking compared with the freight's straight Clear.
On another 4th of July road trip to Pittsburgh I had the opportunity to hit of a couple of interesting rail locations, unfortunately I was not blessed by much in the way of actual rail movements so this will be a rather short post. If you are interested in the history of AR tower in Galitizin or GLENWOOD JCT tower in Pittsburgh, I will be making posts about those separately. You can find the full set of photos here ( mirror ).
So my first stop was the climax of the PRR in Galitizin, PA, 248 miles from Suburban Station in Philadelphia and 2,167 feet above sea level. I stopped off at the little railfan park that hosts PRR N5 caboose #477859.
I was actually on my way out when an westbound NS intermodal emerged from the tunnel with C44-9W #9750, SD70ACC #1829 and C44-9W #9578 in the lead.
My motivation for the stop was reports of AR tower being prepped for demolition and then additional reports that said demolition plans had been put on hold. Upon visiting AR tower I found the reports to be accurate and took some photos accordingly.
From there I went express to Pittsburgh where I wound up getting some fantastic ice creame at the Page Dairy Mart in the shadow of the PRR's Port Perry Branch, currently used by high clearance NS trains that can't fit on the route via the downtown station and Fort Wayne Bridge.
The beefy PRR viaduct spans Becks Run and Beck's Run Road and was immediately adjacent to the old BECK tower that was unfortunately demolished just a few years ago.
While waiting for my ice cream an eastbound CSX coal train went by on the adjacent former P&LE main line (CSX Pittsburgh Sub) with ES44AC #902 on the front and #741 on the back.
The line was pretty long and I was still there when an eastbound autorack movement followed the coal train with ES44AC #856 behind C40-10W #5426.
