Bound for Grand Central Terminal, a New York Central M.U. train passes under the Henry Hudson Parkway bridge at Spuyten Duyvil, N.Y., in the late 1940s or early ’50s. In the background, NYC’s line down the West Side of Manhattan bridges the Harlem River where the Harlem meets the Hudson. Herbert H. Harwood Jr. photo […]
Conrail passenger trains are probably the least known of all the aspects of the big blue railroad’s operations over time. As Conrail is the Fallen Flag Railroad of the Month for April 2022, please enjoy these Conrail passenger trains images from Kalmbach Media’s David P. Morgan Library. Conrail started operations April 1, 1976 taking over […]
A Baltimore & Ohio class P-6 Pacific passes CM Tower at Du Bois, Pa., with Pittsburgh–Buffalo train 252 in September 1955. This is the old Buffalo, Rochester & Pittsburgh, which became part of B&O in 1932. Philip R. Hastings photo […]
The breakthrough The first Electro-Motive doodlebug motorcar to be delivered went to the Chicago Great Western in August 1924. Right from the first run, founder Hal Hamilton’s expectation that railroads would overload the equipment was confirmed. The gas-electric car and its transmission system had been rated and advertised as being capable of handling a 35-ton […]
Conrail history starts with Penn Central’s bankruptcy in 1970, a collapse that upset the entire railroad industry. Something had to be done — Penn Central could not simply be liquidated. It operated one-third of the nation’s passenger trains and was the principal freight carrier in the Northeast. Without PC, the industries of the area would […]
The New Berlin & Winfield was a 3-foot-gauge short line in central Pennsylvania extending from Winfield on the west shore of the West Branch of the Susquehanna River to New Berlin. It opened in 1905, quite late for a narrow-gauge common carrier. NB&W 2-6-0 No. 2, photographed at New Berlin around 1910, went to Argent […]
Reading T-1 4-8-4 2102 is a steam locomotive of the Reading Company T-1 class locomotives built by the Reading in the 1940s. No. 2102 is expected to return to service in 2022 on passenger excursion runs in eastern Pennsylvania on lines operated by its owner on his railroad, the Reading & Northern. Periodic updates are […]
Between Dallastown Junction and Yoe, Pa., on the Maryland & Pennsylvania, railfans fill a flatcar outfitted with railings during a fantrip on Oct. 6, 1940. William M. Moedinger photo […]
Saluda Grade future possibilities are murky. Nearly 22 years have passed since freight trains descended Southern Railway’s Saluda Mountain. Kudzu vines conceal the right-of-way in many places and heavy Appalachian rains have washed away sections of track. Although shrubs and small trees are reclaiming North America’s steepest main line in rural western North Carolina, Norfolk […]
In a 1958 view from a car headed east on Roosevelt Road near West Chicago, Ill., an Elgin, Joliet & Eastern 2,000 h.p. Baldwin center-cab diesel crosses with a northbound freight train. Russ Porter photo […]
Delaware Lackawanna and Western locomotives: All through March, Classic Trains editors are celebrating the Delaware, Lackawanna & Western Railroad. Please enjoy this photo selection of DL&W locomotives selected from the image archives of Kalmbach Media’s David P. Morgan Library. Lackawanna steam locomotives were top-notch among Northeast coal-hauling roads. The railroad’s last steam locomotive ran in […]
Central of Georgia launched two new intrastate streamliners in 1947. At an unidentified location, the Atlanta–Savannah Nancy Hanks II (left) stands beside the Columbus–Atlanta Man o’ War. Central of Georgia photo […]
