A westbound grain train is plodding up the steep grade from Pica to Yampai summit. After surmounting the grade in another mile, it will be downhill for over a hundred miles to Needles.

CR 3276, a former Reading Company GP40-2, is in charge of symbol ALPI as the manifest ascends the mountain. Horseshoe Curve lays in the valley beyond the classic PRR-era signal bridge at this remo... (more)

UP 6788 West cruises down the Boyer River valley on an early spring afternoon. The former C&NW line, single tracked for many years, was soon restored to two main tracks after UP took ownership.

It is almost nostalgic to see a coal train these days but just a few years ago they ran in profusion. Here another set of empties heads back to Wyoming.

On one of those exhilarating mornings with the cool air fresh with the scent of pines, the 4871 East is pouring on the power for the grade to Marias Pass. The train is stretched out across the Jav... (more)

If Bobby Troup had followed US 2 along the Great Northern instead of Route 66 beside the Santa Fe, he might have written an entirely different tune: You go through Minot, Essex and Sandpoint but d... (more)

A westbound mail train is attacking the mountain on a May afternoon. Power is typical of the era - a trio of four axle GE and EMD power, although newer units were soon to take over. The scene is b... (more)

On one of those capricious spring days when the sun is in and out of the clouds, and at a time when there was still some auto parts business from the GM and Ford plants at Linden and Metuchen, NJ,... (more)

As snow comes to the Heartland this Easter Sunday, I thought I'd go back to an April day in '93 when rain turned to snow overnight and yielded a heavy, wet snow in central Pennsylvania. At MG, hal... (more)

A pair of Locomotive Management Services Dash 8s, leaving no doubt as to their caretaker, lead a westbound intermodal train past old Huntingdon Block Station on a July afternoon. Ektachrome.

One could always find interesting power along the Santa Fe. The Fourth of July, '96, found SF30C 9514 leading a B23-7, F45 and Dash9 44CW racing across the Mississippi River bottom lands with a we... (more)

An early summer afternoon finds a set of BN SD70MACs leading several C30-7s on a coal empty as it crosses the Missouri River near Plattsmouth, NE. The impressive Pennsylvania Through Truss bridge ... (more)

It's a long descent from Mountainair, NM into the valley of the Rio Grande river at Belen. Approaching Abo Canyon, BNSF 4710 is easing down the grade with an ethanol train. Another two units are o... (more)

Five pack of fast forties: A westbound van train has arrived in Cheyenne and is cut away from their train in order to make a pickup. The power is five of the 8000 series "fast forty" SD4... (more)

A pair of big, beautiful BN SD70MACs come rolling off the Omaha Sub in Ashland, NE with empty hoppers headed west toward Lincoln and the Powder River mines. The train is crossing the Sioux line di... (more)