Join Assistant Editor Brian Schmidt for a look at BNSF Railway’s famed “Racetrack,” the former Chicago, Burlington & Quincy main line between Chicago and Aurora, Ill. You’ll see fast freights along with Amtrak and Metra passenger moves along the triple-track speedway at the Naperville and Route 59 stations. For more Chicago railroading, be sure to […]
Extra tall fences (seen on the overpass in the background) often protect electrified lines from road debris. Michael S. Murray Q I have driven over the Northeast Corridor and have seen guardrails on the bridge get higher over the tracks themselves. Why is that? – Dan Wescott, Louisburg, N.C. A The primary reason higher barriers […]
An on-time eastbound Empire Builder pauses at Minot, N.D., for servicing on Aug. 20, 2014. Bob Johnston RUGBY, N.D. — Snow and ice are burying much of North Dakota this week, but Amtrak’s Empire Builder soldiers on. While national TV news and published reports recounted how thousands of flights were cancelled, trucks jackknifed all over […]
Marc Horovitz Passenger cars Gauge 1, 1:22.5-scale coach and combine Bachmann Trains 1400 East Erie Avenue Philadelphia PA 19124 Price: $139 Website: www.bachmanntrains.com All plastic gauge-1 coach and combine; insulated metal wheelsets; truck-mounted working knuckle couplers; hook-and-loop couplers also supplied; track-powered interior lighting; interior details; sliding door on the combine Pros: Attractive passenger stock; good […]
Artwork from a booklet promoting the Milwaukee Road’s 1947 Olympian Hiawatha shows the interior of a 14-section “Touralux” sleeping car. Classic Trains coll. […]
A man and girl walk past the Blue Bird’s dome-observation car as they board the Wabash’s streamliner to St. Louis at Dearborn Station, Chicago, in the 1950s. Bill Wight photo […]
An E5 heads up one of the first Burlington Route commuter train to sport the new bi-level “gallery” cars delivered by Budd in 1950. The train is eastbound at famous Naperville curve on the triple-track west of Chicago. Bob Borcherding photo […]
A special Brightline train is set to complete its more than 3,000-mile journey from California to south Florida this week. The train was on Florida East Coast rails for the first time today in Jacksonville, Fla., with FEC milepost 0 immediately behind the train. Eric Hendrickson JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — The first new trainset for a […]
Models pose for the camera inside Moon Glow, the Train of Tomorrow’s dome-observation-lounge car. GM and Pullman-Standard built the four-car, E7-powered ToT in 1947. General Motors photo […]
The Metroliners: Trains that changed the course of American rail travel By Bruce Goldberg and David C. Warner White River Productions, P.O. Box 48, Bucklin, MO 64631; 124 pages, hardcover, 8 ½ x 11 inches; $59.95 shop.whiteriverproductions.com Recounting the history of the Northeast Corridor’s first premium service in a breezy narrative that knows what to […]
Former Southern Pacific Budd rail diesel car SP-10 on a flat car in Texas on Nov. 17. RDC SP-10 Facebook page GALVESTON, Texas —Somewhere in the West this Thanksgiving, there is a Southern Pacific Budd rail diesel car on its way home. RDC SP-10 began the long journey from the Galveston Railroad Museum back to […]
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