West Coast passenger trains

What you’re seeing here is a transformation that’s nothing short of remarkable. Twenty years ago, a map of West Coast short-haul passenger trains would’ve been little more than a blank page. Back then, Amtrak provided minimal service between Oakland and Bakersfield, Calif., and between Portland and Seattle, though it did field 14 San Diegans a […]

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Serving the president of the Katy

The Katy-Frisco Texas Special, a favorite conveyance for the Katy president’s business car, arrives in St. Louis in 1956. Fred Scott My railroad-related career started in 1941, when I was hired as a stenographer by the South-Western Freight Bureau in St. Louis. It was readily accepted for a young man who had studied shorthand and […]

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Flying high

A southbound grain train flies through Sidney, Ohio, on an elevated right-of-way built by predecessor Baltimore & Ohio, on May 10, 2012. The train is crossing Ohio Route 47 on the west side of downtown. Photo by Brian Schmidt […]

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Night moves

  New England Central GP38-2 No. 3850 leads a southbound local on the Palmer Subdivision through Windsor, Vt., on May 10, 2013. Photo by William Gill […]

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Railroading in Maine at 40 below zero

Five years after author Dow’s Bangor & Aroostook experience, in March 1955, a 103-car freight waits at snowy West Seboois, Maine, for a meet with the Aroostook Flyer. Allen A. Sharp The temperature on that February 1950 morning at Oakfield, Maine, was a savage 40 degrees below zero. The sky was clear, with little or […]

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Amtrak to end food service on ‘Hiawatha’ route NEWSWIRE

A southbound ‘Hiawatha’ at Maple Street departing Milwaukee. Brian Schmidt MILWAUKEE – Amtrak will discontinue food service on the Hiawatha route effective July 1. The Hiawatha trains are not equipped with a cafe car; an employee provides snack service on a cart throughout the train on select trains, weekdays only. Peg Schmitt, with the Wisconsin Department […]

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Amtrak to detour Coast Starlight over Tehachapi Loop NEWSWIRE

LOS ANGELES – Amtrak is planning to detour its southbound Coast Starlight between Oakland and Los Angeles in March and April due to track work. Instead of its normal route along the California Coast, train No. 11 will travel Union Pacific’s ex-Southern Pacific route via the San Joaquin Valley and Tehachapi Loop. The detours are planned for March 13-15, March 24-30, […]

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Duck, duck, belle?

Two Kansas City Southern “Southern Belles” cross the Kankakee River at Momence, Ill., on a southbound Union Pacific container train on July 16, 2011. The route between Chicago and Woodland Junction, Ill., is jointly operated by CSX and UP. Photo by Brian M. Schmidt […]

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Getting to know Miss Katy

In February 1944, Katy 2-8-2 910 rolls into Denton, Texas, with empty tank cars, probably destined for a refill in the Oklahoma oil fields. Frank Rogers During the fall and winter of 1943-44, I was in the Army’s Specialized Training Program at North Texas State Teachers College in Denton, Texas, about 35 miles north of […]

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