Traffic on the big six Class I railroads was a mixed bag in the third quarter, as three systems saw gains versus a year ago and three experienced volume declines. For the third quarter, which ended Sept. 30, total volume on the big six systems was up an average of 0.5%, according to a Trains […]
Classic Toy Trains’ Professor Carp looks at the history of Kusan boxcars. He shows some examples and details the company’s manufacturing in Tennessee and Mexico, where a number of interesting variations of the company’s “K” Series cars were produced. Those produced south of the border fetch a premium. […]
Classic Toy Trains’ Professor Carp looks at the history of Kusan boxcars. He shows some examples and details the company’s manufacturing in Tennessee and Mexico, where a number of interesting variations of the company’s “K” Series cars were produced. Those produced south of the border fetch a premium. […]
PALM DESERT, Calif. — Two people suffered what were described as “critical burn injuries” after a container on a Union Pacific train caught fire Friday, leading to a temporary halt to traffic on the rail line as well as closure of one direction of adjacent Interstate 10 for about two hours. The Desert Sun newspaper […]
Hollywood Round windows marked the 1941 City of Los Angeles’s swank lounge car Hollywood. The train operated over Union Pacific and Chicago & North Western between its namesake city and Chicago. Classic Trains collection […]
Surface Transportation Board Chairman Martin J. Oberman ruffled some feathers this month when he said railroads’ drive for ever-increasing profits resulted in a loss of market share to trucks over the past 15 years and continues to restrain growth today. Oberman cited STB figures that show a decline in rail traffic between 2006 and 2019 […]
CHICAGO – Union Pacific has won a key legal ruling in its long-running dispute with Metra regarding operations of three commuter routes. A federal judge on Thursday ruled that UP has no common carrier obligation to provide commuter service on the UP North, UP West, and UP Northwest Lines. Metra had sought to show that UP […]
Sherman Hill is one of the landmarks on the transcontinental railroad. It was the first major obstacle for the railroad as it headed west. It’s the highest point on the first transcontinental railroad with the original summit topping out at 8,247 feet above sea level. A 1901 line change shaved over 200 feet off the […]
PORTLAND, Maine – Union Pacific is considering joining the Rail Pulse joint venture that is developing a GPS-based, real-time tracking system for freight cars wherever they are on the North American rail network. “Rail Pulse is interesting. We’ve got to make a decision on Rail Pulse pretty soon,” Kenny Rocker, UP’s executive vice president of marketing […]
SEATTLE — Union Pacific will pay more than $80,000 in penalties, along with reimbursement of cleanup costs, in a settlement with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency over a 2016 derailment that spilled crude oil in the Columbia River Gorge near Mosier, Ore. The June 3, 2016, derailment saw 16 cars of a train with 96 […]
San Francisco Overland Future excursion locomotive UP 844, having just taken over for an SP locomotive, departs Ogden Union Station with the San Francisco Overland on June 18, 1950. The Fairbanks-Morse “Erie-built” diesels at right will follow with the Los Angeles Limited. Don Sims photo […]
CHICAGO –—Climate change provides an opportunity for railroads, even as more frequent extreme weather events take a toll on railroad operations and infrastructure and require investments in new locomotive technology, executives told a shipper conference last week. The increased emphasis on sustainability is a tremendous opportunity for rail carriers, BNSF CEO Katie Farmer told the […]
