The Trackside Lounge 2Q 2012

Now what are you doing up at this hour?

Was giving a conductor a ride, saving him a long walk.  Nearest TM/Carman was an hour away so I helped out.

Aww, nothing like a moonlit walk in the ballast at night.  A man alone with his thoughts (which made it a lonely trek in my case).

Thanks, Dan, from a onetime ballast-pounder (in inner-city Chicago, no less!  Thank Goodness it was only one time!).

Went to a railroadiana show at the College of DuPage this noon; saw a few UP/C&NW retirees there who have come out of any closets they might have been hiding in (closet railfans at work, perhaps).  MC, were you acquainted at all with Bill Wimmer?  He was there, though I was too much in awe to talk to him (those of you who don't know, he's the guy who liked to check the quality of UP track by running the DDA40X over it).  I bought one reference book (the latest edition of Railroad Names by the late William D. Edson).

Next on the agenda today:  Lilacia Park--nearly at its peak, over a month ahead of the Lilac Festival--and dinner with grandchildren and their parents. 

P.S.  There be tracks between the park and the dinner...

Thought the lounge might enjoy this short video clip I saw on FB today...

watch?v=iORsbiMAsM

  Thanks for sharing !      You bet !  That was great !  (Much better than that overcrowded ship that sank about 100 years ago.)

  Just as long as there isn't a grade crossing or livestock collision waiting around the next curve !

- Paul North.   

Nice one, Darren!  I showed it to Pat, and she said that all it needed was the music...then it repeated itself.

I can think of any number of reasons I wouldn't want to stand out in front like that for very long.  My line at work was, "It must be spring--I swallowed my first bug today."  (Serious bikers will know about this.)

Carl, I forgot to say thank you for the information on the MP express car.   

Thanks for the info.

CShaveRR

I can think of any number of reasons I wouldn't want to stand out in front like that for very long.  

Yeah, like being written up for a safety rule violation.  (No three point contact in case your wondering.)

Jeff

jeffhergert

CShaveRR:

I can think of any number of reasons I wouldn't want to stand out in front like that for very long.  

 

Yeah, like being written up for a safety rule violation.  (No three point contact in case your wondering.)

Jeff

jeffhergert

 

CShaveRR:

 

I can think of any number of reasons I wouldn't want to stand out in front like that for very long.  

 

 

Yeah, like being written up for a safety rule violation.  (No three point contact in case your wondering.)

Jeff

Give a man enough rope...right?

In exciting news...ATCS is now turned on in my area...so time to get to work on the scanner.  It'll be like shooting fish in a barrel now!

One for carl:

Today we had a LRS boxcar, ex Ma & Pa. 

And another UTLX molasses tank - built in 75.

Another one for Carl-

Saw this one in the yard in Neenah, Wisconsin

Logimex

NDYX 816902

I don't usually notice reporting marks on railcars, but this one caught my attention.

Zug, you got me with that one--my files don't show any LRS cars coming from MPA, so that's something I'll want more info on, when you can grab a number.  I suspect that the car probably originated with MPA, but MPA cars have been gone for many years now, and some have had many subsequent operators.  LRS has just begun to acquire a lot of secondhand cars over the past couple of years, so I'm not surprised that something like this would turn up.

I hope those molasses cars stick around...

...long enough for you to get a number and a lessee stencil off them.  They sound interesting!

And 22, you may have an unusual one here.  Cars in this series may (816800-816904) may be lettered either NOKL, NDYX, or FURX (First Union Rail in all cases), but I don't know whose cars they were before then.  I've seen them as NOKL cars.  One source says that they're ex-AAMX (a Mexican company), same numbers, but that doesn't account for them back to their 1978-1979 build dates (they were built in Canada by Marine Industries).

Check thy messages, Carl.

"I hope those molasses cars stick around..."

Very punny, Carl...very punny!!

Messages seen and responded to, Tom.

Nance, glad you're not as slow as...

__________________

Have to go in for a EKG and heart monitoring this afternoon; the last of the examinations prompted by my problems last month (I still think it was just a virus).  I'll be wearing a wire (or something) for a day, which I hope will contain a sleep cycle and some strenuous activity...lawn-mowing and bicycling are among the things that come to mind.  I'm still not supposed to be driving, but we've pretty much ignored that for the past week or so.  Now working on some old GAEX, GARX, and URTX cars for the files.

Gave the heart-monitor people something to look at, with a bike trip to West Chicago and back.  The monitor was returned after the bike trip.  (I'm hoping to lose weight by tackling one of these trips once a week when we're not away from home.)  Most of the trains I saw on UP seemed to be stackers, but a couple of manifests livened things up for me.  The best event was at Glen Ellyn, where a westbound auto-rack train overtook a manifest--the combination was long enough to get me westbound past the village's three grade crossings before they opened to cross traffic.

Carl; I had a problem 3 yrs. back , it turned out to be ( irregular ) heartbeat.  Got script for  digoxin 0.25 mg. every thing is fine. No restrictions of any kind. Sawbones said  CDL would not be affected for re up. But now if I wanted back on the road  I would be , (get this)  over qualified  not too old at 75yrs.  Slick way to get around age descrimination. Iam glad we pulled the pin 5 yrs.back.  My sweetie said d.o.t.  could  xxx her ~~~ .  We are  happy though.

                                               Respectfully, Cannonball & Hurricane Shirley

Thanks, Cannonball!  I had my tachycardia trigger removed a couple of years ago.  My regular doctor detected a strange murmur at my last visit, and that's what this was supposed to check out.  My echo-cardiogram results are considered normal; I haven't heard back yet about their monitoring of 24 hours' worth of heart activity.  I guess that no news should be construed as good news.

And, speaking of good news, our buddy Brian Hanel just became a grandpa!  Congratulations to Brian and Joanie, their daughter, and their son-in-law on the new baby boy, born late last night.

Oh, congratulations, all around!!

CShaveRR

..... I haven't heard back yet about their monitoring of 24 hours' worth of heart activity.  I guess that no news should be construed as good news.....

I would never presume something as serious as health; if you have not been informed within a reasonable amount of time, I would strongly suggest you call them and ask for the results to be mailed to you (always keep a paper copy, just in case...).

And ditto on congrats to Brian!

Jim, what they actually said is that I will be contacted by my doctor within five to seven days, but if there is a problem I will be contacted sooner.  I returned the monitor on Thursday, was notified about my Echo test yesterday.  I would have no clue what to expect from the monitor thing, but I could definitely explain some of the variety they may have seen (mowing the lawn, the big bike trip, etc.).

I hope that Easter was joyous and meaningful for all who celebrated it.  We were in church or around church for nearly five hours (and our minister's family had hidden plastic eggs all over the lawn for the young ones after the service!).

This afternoon I‎ saved a few commuters from major embarrassment. I was on the station platform with my bike, multi-tasking (might as well write my letter out where I could see some trains go by, right?). An eastbound scoot had just left, picking up passengers on Track 1, as usual. Before and during his stop, the P.A. was announcing that the next westbound scoot would be boarding on Track 1. I had convinced one rider to come over to the Track 1 platform to catch his westbound before the eastbound had come and gone. Others heard the announcement and came on their own. The schedules give 13 minutes between the two trains. One person asked me if he'd heard correctly. "The eastbound train was on this track, right?" "Yes." "And the westbound train's going to come in on..." "Same track." "Oh, boy! I can't wait to see this", he said, making a colliding gesture and noise.

The five-minute warning for the westbound scoot came over the P.A., followed by another reminder that the train would be boarding from Track 1. In a few more minutes, the train came around the curve east of Grace Street--on Track 3. One guy saw that, and started to cross the tracks, just as the warning bell started to ring (that's a $250 fine if anyone caught him). The others started to follow him. I had to yell, "Stay here!" They came back, and the first guy started to argue with me about how they'd miss the train, etc., etc. I said, "Look again." When he looked, the train was crossing Grace on Track 2, and crossing over to Track 1. It stopped with the door right in front of them.

I love it when the new crossovers still come as a surprise to some people.  In spite of the fact that another scoot wouldn't come for two hours, nobody even stopped to say thanks, though.

CShaveRR

In spite of the fact that another scoot wouldn't come for two hours, nobody even stopped to say thanks, though.

I traveled to Mount Prospect, Ill. to see Mom and Dad for Easter.  I didn't see any train activity while driving north on I-55.  On the way home, just south of Atlanta, Ill, I caught up to a BNSF DPU on a southbound covered hopper train.  I paced the engine around sixty miles per hour.  It has been quite a while since I paced a train.  I hit "resume" on the cruise control and slowly started passing the train.  I caught the lead engines (two more BNSF units) as I-55 crossed over the tracks just north on Lincoln.

In Springfield, Ill., I saw some Southern covered hoppers sitting on one of the railroad overpasses.  They still had SOUTHERN written between the ribs across the side in large letters with the car number underneath.  With traffic moving at speed, I was unable to catch the numbers.  The markings were well faded with age and rust.  It was, still, neat to see fallen flag cars.

That has been the most train related things I've seen since November.  I have to get out more. 

I've seen plenty of SOUTHERN labelled (but not marked) covered hoppers moving north on CN.  Usually empties moving north and loads heading back south.

Hoping to get out trackside today...maybe attempt a surgical photo strike if conditions (STL&H and/or SOO) warrant.

It's a little cool here, but we're going out on our bikes in a little while.  Nearly everything we have to do (post office, bank, lunch) is near the tracks.  I think the wind has shifted, so the station platform isn't downwind of Lilacia Park like it was Sunday afternoon.   Mmmmmmm!   Ahhhhhhh!

James, I'm a little surprised at BNSF power on a train through Atlanta--I was under the impression that that was UP track all the way along 55, and I'm not aware of any trackage or haulage rights through there.

NS has unloaded a lot of its ex-SOU covered hoppers, but I would suspect that they wouldn't have kept their big lettering if they were secondhand.

I'm excited...I'm doing another train-watching trip tomorrow.  This one will be a short one, just in the morning, for a seven-year-old and one of his parents (his mother was in our church's youth group; she's a couple of years older than my older daughter).  After going to Elmhurst to catch a few trains, we'll join the rest of the family in Glen Ellyn for lunch at 2Toots...more trains, I hope.  I will make sure that Zachary gets a copy of Trains4Kids.

Hey...can you tell that retirement is a blast for me?