In reply to NickD :
IIRC it was either Friday or Saturday, late in the day. I believe the engine was a "yard engine", which is why I was a little surprised that it didn't come back.
In reply to NickD :
IIRC it was either Friday or Saturday, late in the day. I believe the engine was a "yard engine", which is why I was a little surprised that it didn't come back.
I'm fairly certain I saw a few (3 in total) BNSF trains waaaaay up here in Canada a month or two ago as part of a long freight, and we are deep in CN territory here.
I thought it was strange, not certain I kept the picture I took or not..
So maybe BNSF is contracting out extra engines? Or they were sold off and put into service before a respray/marking
DjGreggieP said:I'm fairly certain I saw a few (3 in total) BNSF trains waaaaay up here in Canada a month or two ago as part of a long freight, and we are deep in CN territory here.
I thought it was strange, not certain I kept the picture I took or not..
So maybe BNSF is contracting out extra engines? Or they were sold off and put into service before a respray/marking
There was BNSF GEs on a grain train in Little Falls, NY last month which I thought was odd, because NY is CSX and NS territory. But someone said BNSF is running pooled power trains on CSX lines. "Pooled power," as explained by Bryan Schmidt, "often called “run-through power,” streamlines the interchange process. Railroads are able to exchange trains without exchanging locomotives, which saves time and money. These arrangements are usually billed by the horsepower hour, meaning railroads pay for the power of a given locomotive for the time it is used. Sometimes, when the train reaches its destination, the power is used for other jobs by the receiving railroad before being sent back home. This arrangement can lead to extended stays for locomotives on “foreign” railroads, and the appearance of such units on routes without run-through trains."
So those BNSF units in Canada might be on a pooled power agreement. But I also have seen photos of BNSF parking hundreds of locomotives, so it could be that CN is a bit short on motive power and BNSF is lending them out to get some money out of them, instead of paying to store them.
In the '70s, Penn Central and Canadian Pacific had a pooled power agreement, and the habitually power-short CP used to "borrow" the Penn Central units that were stored in their yard over the weekends for other usage. Penn Central was in such disarray they never noticed, but after Conrail was formed, they caught on pretty quick and began charging CP for the additional use they were putting on their equipment.
I've seen the occasional BNSF engine working on the West Shore Line, mixed in with the usual CSX stuff. Probably a similar situation.
We have a high-traffic CSX freight line that runs NE/SW directly through our town. It parallels a couple of main streets, lifted on a causeway with overpasses near the east side of town, but with a series of large crossings right through a large 5-points street intersection. The other day I was running parallel to a train running through town at a steady 35 mph. I happened to make note of the motive units and figured I'd look them up.
In the lead was CSX 3277. She appears to be a General Electric ET44AC. Not sure of build date but the oldest picture I easily found was 2017.
Next up in the 3-loco group was CSX 3400, a GE ET44AH. The one scrap of history I can find on this loco suggests that she was listed as a new unit in 2016.
Last but not least was CSX 244 - a GE AC44CW. Also not a lot of build history I could find on this one, though I located pics as old as 2003.
Duke said:In the lead was CSX 3277. She appears to be a General Electric U23B (?) or ET44AC (?), built in August 1973. She was originally L&N 2748, later moving to SBD in 1983, where she was renumbered to 3277 and then went CSX in 1986.
...Are they really still building this design after 40+ years?
It was almost certainly the ET44AC. I don't think there are any GE U-boats in general service, certainly not with a Class 1. They got retired pretty early on and hardly any are preserved. Even their replacements" the Dash-7 series are far and few between. The ET44AC is a newer design from the 2000s.
In reply to NickD :
Yeah, I assume the U23B was an earlier #3277.
In reply to Duke :
It was- the previous CSX #3277 (U23B) was built on September 1, 1973 as L&N 2748. It became Seaboard System 2748 in 1983 and was renumbered to 3277 in 1984. It became CSX 3277 in April 1986 and was sold eight years later to National Railway Equipment Co in August 1994.
As an aside, I've always loved that pug nosed look the U-boats had...
Another tidbit- you'll notice all of CSX's locomotives and rolling stock are actually lettered CSXT (number). This is because under AAR lettering conventions any reporting marks ending in "X" are privately owned by an entity other than a railroad. So, instead of CSX, it is CSX"T" for transportation.
Recon1342 said:Another tidbit- you'll notice all of CSX's locomotives and rolling stock are actually lettered CSXT (number). This is because under AAR lettering conventions any reporting marks ending in "X" are privately owned by an entity other than a railroad. So, instead of CSX, it is CSX"T" for transportation.
Also another CSX oddity, is that unlike UP or NS or BNSF, who are all referred to as their real names at times and their acronyms at others, CSX is always called by its acronym. Because what does CSX even stand for? Well, the C is for Chessie Systems, which was one half of the merger. The S is for Seaboard Systems. And the X? Well, according to the first press release, the X stood for nothing.They actually wanted CSC (Chessie Seaboard Corporation/Consolidated/Company) but that acronym was already taken. Then they wanted CSM (Chessie Seaboard Merger, perhaps) but that was also taken. So then they settled on CSX. Later on, they claimed the X stood for Consolidated.
In reply to NickD :
They should have claimed it meant "Extreme" then they would have had an easy excuse for derailments.
Recon1342 said:As an aside, I've always loved that pug nosed look the U-boats had...
Yeah, the U-boats and the Dash-7s were good looking a clean, stripped-down way. Tough call whether I prefer them in Burlington Northern green and white
Or in Chessie Systems yellow, orange and dark blue
NickD said:Recon1342 said:Another tidbit- you'll notice all of CSX's locomotives and rolling stock are actually lettered CSXT (number). This is because under AAR lettering conventions any reporting marks ending in "X" are privately owned by an entity other than a railroad. So, instead of CSX, it is CSX"T" for transportation.
Also another CSX oddity, is that unlike UP or NS or BNSF, who are all referred to as their real names at times and their acronyms at others, CSX is always called by its acronym. Because what does CSX even stand for? Well, the C is for Chessie Systems, which was one half of the merger. The S is for Seaboard Systems. And the X? Well, according to the first press release, the X stood for nothing.They actually wanted CSC (Chessie Seaboard Corporation/Consolidated/Company) but that acronym was already taken. Then they wanted CSM (Chessie Seaboard Merger, perhaps) but that was also taken. So then they settled on CSX. Later on, they claimed the X stood for Consolidated.
It was probably lucky CSC was taken. Here in Michigan, in law enforcement anyway, that stands for Criminal Sexual Conduct.
Pete Gossett (Forum Supporter) said:In reply to NickD :
They should have claimed it meant "Extreme" then they would have had an easy excuse for derailments.
I would have gone full marketing BS and been like "It stands for the multiplicative potential of the merger"
NickD said:Recon1342 said:As an aside, I've always loved that pug nosed look the U-boats had...
Yeah, the U-boats and the Dash-7s were good looking a clean, stripped-down way. Tough call whether I prefer them in Burlington Northern green and white
Or in Chessie Systems yellow, orange and dark blue
I'm partial to the old Santa Fe scheme, prior to the "bluebonnet" freight scheme.
My favorite paint scheme of all time, however is that of the failed SP +SF merger, known to railfans the world over as "Shouldn't Paint So Fast". Especially on an EMD F45, that paint job just speaks to me...
In reply to Recon1342 :
Ahhh, the ol' Kodachrome paint scheme.
NickD said:Pete Gossett (Forum Supporter) said:In reply to NickD :
They should have claimed it meant "Extreme" then they would have had an easy excuse for derailments.
I would have gone full marketing BS and been like "It stands for the multiplicative potential of the merger"
I was thinking more like catching air in extreme sports, but yeah, you're correct, that's exactly what would have happened.
ouch!
Purple Frog (Forum Supporter) said:ouch!
When/where?
In reply to NickD :
Chessie all the way. One of the car washes my dad owned backed directly onto a big freight line and I used to climb the bank and watch the big Chessie System trains roll by, and wave to the crews. I always liked that livery.
In reply to Recon1342 :
CNN says Tempe, AZ, earlier today. Cleanup is gonna take a minute on this one.
In reply to kazoospec :
Yeah, that one looks messy...
We had a good one in Quebec a couple years ago: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lac-M%C3%A9gantic_rail_disaster
I remember some silly person was on the news, fuming about "How could they allow the railroad to run right through the center of town like this?!?!?!".
Clearly she didn't realise that the railroad had been there all along and the town grew around it.
ShawnG said:"How could they allow the railroad to run right through the center of town like this?!?!?!".
Clearly she didn't realise that the railroad had been there all along and the town grew around it.
The New York Central main line used to run right through the center of Oneida, NY and then in the early fifties, they relocated the main line out of the town, because they had a nasty accident where a fire truck that was responding to a call got hit by a train at a grade crossing. According to my father's co-worker, who was the son of the engineer, they were doing over 80mph through the middle of the city. And apparently they did that kind of speed through the city frequently, which is pretty frightening, because it was one of those tracks that ran up the middle of a street.
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