Philadelphia’s commuter agency has traditionally saluted the retirement of elderly equipment from its fleet, and so it will be on Dec. 1 when it operates a brief “Farewell to the AEM-7 Locomotives” excursion. This will be the last such trip for the electric locomotives also known by their nickname, “Toasters” because of their boxy appearance: The only other operators, Amtrak and MARC, previously retired their versions.
The special train will depart Paoli along the Paoli-Thorndale line, the original Pennsylvania Railroad Main Line, at 10:25 a.m. with stops at Wayne, Radnor, Bryn Mawr, and 30th Street Station with a final stop at Suburban Station in downtown Philadelphia. While at Suburban Station, passengers will have an opportunity to visit SEPTA’s western-themed holiday train on display. The return trip to Paoli departs at 12:10 p.m., making the same stops on the return journey before terminating at Paoli.
Besides their appearance, the units are best known as the electrics that replaced the legendary GG1 locomotives on the Northeast Corridor.
SEPTA’s AEM-7s are more than 30 years old and have been replaced by newer, more powerful Siemens ACS-64 locomotives. Despite their age, they are in fine condition, having made only two round trips five days a week for most of their service lives.
EMD built 54 twin cab four-axle, 7,000-hp AEM-7s for Amtrak at its LaGrange plant in the late 1970s and early 1980s. The Maryland Transit Administration, operator of MARC commuter service on the Northeast Corridor between Washington and Baltimore, rostered four; SEPTA purchased seven copies of the model.
Two have been preserved: Amtrak No. 915 at the Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania, and No. 945 at Illinois Railway Museum.
I would agree with Eric Rickert – if the locomotives are in good shape, why replace them. Plan for the time they crump, of course, but run them until then and save taxpayers some money.
If they’re in fine condition, then why do they need to be replaced? The GG-1’s lasted for fifty years until their frames started to get fatigued.
Thanks for the reminder just how much time has passed. I remember seeing a GG 1 (or sometimes 2!) in PC black sprinting aTOFC to Cedar Hill Yard when I was a freshman in high school, along the old New Haven in Green’s Farms Ct. I have some nice slides somewhere of one in Bridgeport after I dropped my sister off to go back to Rhode Island. Ditto for one being switched in at Harrisburg on my way back home from a summer of working on the American Freedom Train in the summer of 1975.
I missed them when the left Amtrak , but the AEM 7’s proved to be nobel decendants. They could really turn a wheel. Took one to Boston within a week after the completion of electrification project. And rode behind on that took me and my Dad to the dedication of the WWII monument in DC on a picture perfect Memorial Day in 2003, Dad being a Veteran of the Army Air Corp 8th Air Force, The Mighty 8th, 487th Bomb Group. We had a whale of a time.
And now they (and Pop) are gone. While there is no replacing Dad in my life, the AEM’ deserve a place in more than one museum, starting with the Pennslyvania Railroad museum in Lancaster. I wish them , and their successors , well.