04-01-21 CLASSIC PHOTOS: Pittsburgh Alliance

Towards the end of my semester break during the winter of 2024 I found another friend who was interested in trying out my old playbook of running the triangle route between Philly, Pittsburgh and Washington DC. 2005 would see a substantial curtailment of the, but in 2004 the old PRR Main Line was still hosting two trains in either direction and Pennsylvanian Train 43 departed 30th St Station around 9am, completing the full trip to Pittsburgh in daylight. The planned connection was to the eastbound Capitol Limited train 30 that had the same customary 530am departure, but naturally things don't always work out to play. You can check out the full set of photos here ( mirror ).

The morning begins with the still-in-service CORK tower in Lancaster PA.  

Later at Harrisburg we pass a Keystone train with P42DC #17. At this time the Keystone Corridor improvement project had necessitated the electrification de-energized west of Thorndale so all Keystones were diesel hauled.

Frozen Susquehanna River as seen from the Rockville Bridge.

The preserved HUNT tower in Huntington, PA.

Passing the Altoona Shoppes was all sorts of power on the dead line awaiting repair, rebuilding or disposal. In no particular order Conrail SD40-2 #3363, NS SD40-2 #3336, former-Southern hi-hood SD40 #3175, NS MP15DC shoppe switcher #2422, wreck damaged Conrail C40-8 #8311, high hood NS GP38AC #2869, high hood SD40 #3174, former Conrail SD50 #6507, Conrail B23-7 #1949 and finally Conrail SD40-2 helper pair #3380 and #3370.

One extra special catch was this line of scale test cars. In fact Conrail #80017 was built for the PRR in 1919!

On the heritage front PRR GG1 #4913 had yet to be put on display at the Railroaders Museum and PRR GP9 #7048 was standing watch at Horseshoe Curve.

MG tower had closed around 1994 while C tower has closed within the previous 12 months.

Conrail SD40-2 #3053 helping out near Galitzin.

Arriving into Pittsburgh Penn Station a pair of NS SD40-2 helpers were hanging out on one of the station tracks. NS would later close the helper base in favor of attacking and detaching helpers at points along the main line or at yards in Altoona and Johnstown.

Also on hand was the repurposed PITT tower and some PRR style position light signals installed during the Conrail era. 

We lingered at the station long enough for the Pennsylvanian to return from its wye move at CP-HOME. Head end power was new P42DC #184.During Amtrak's experiment with mail and express, the Pennsylvanian had run all the way to Chicago, but losses and poor ridership saw this arrangement end less than 2 months before on November 27th, 2003.

After getting dinner in Pittsburgh's Station Square, we went back to Penn Station to catch the passage of westbound Three Rivers train #41. Scheduled to arrive at 10pm, Train #41 featured leading P42DC's #193 and #43. Although Amtrak was stepping back from hauling mail and express, it still had active contracts and a cut of Amtrak road railers were on the back of the Three Rivers seen here passing CP-WEST PITT.

The original plan had been to hang out around Penn Station until the 5am arrival of Capitol Limited Train 30. Well we got word from the station staff that Train 30 was running 3 hours late, thus making it possible to reliably move the connection point one stop to the west to Alliance, OH. Deciding that riding a trains was far more interesting than sitting around a quasi-Amshack, my friend and I purchased some round trip tickets to supplement our existing PGH to WAS ones. Due to the limitations of my equipment I only attempted to take photos during the ~2 hour layover at Alliance, with mixed results.

CP-ALLIANCE is a major junction between the former Conrail Cleveland Line and Fort Wayne Lines where most traffic headed to Chicago veers off to/from Cleveland. The old westbound PRR signal bridge had been recently removed, but I managed some photos of the NS replacements. I also walked to the other ends of the interlocking to at least observe the surviving position lights that would eventually be replaced in the 2010s.

Train 30 showed up at its revised time and despite not having booked a sleeper I immediately fell asleep in a Superliner coach seat. I was so out of it that I didn't wake up until Cumberland, MD, missing quite a bit of the line that I had been looking forward to see :-( Here is CSX C40-8W #7321 and SD40-2 #8380 at Cumberland.

Out of service B&O era towers at MEXICO and PATTERSON CREEK.

An up close and personal view of HANCOCK tower's upper floor.

I'll wrap things up with some photos of VRE F40PH-2 #V30 GP39-2C #V10 in the Ivy City storage yard. V10 is pulling some Sounder coaches which were on lease from the West Coast rail line until VRE's own gallery car order could be filled.

One could assume that given the craziness this was my last time performing such an Amtrak riding stunt, but keep watching my posts and you will be treated to some others.