I'm planning a layout where i can run UP and Amtrak togheter. Can you tell me witch region i can use for this.
Union Pacific and Amtrak in Belgium
It depends upon which date you are interested in.
For example, the Amtrak Pioneer:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pioneer_(train)
was operated from 1977 to 1997, and it ran on the Union Pacific from Portland to Salt Lake City.
Incidentally, Amtrak started May 1, 1971.
Ed
Chicago to St Louis, St Louis to Kansas City, St Louis to Dallas, Taylor, TX to San Antonio, Salt Lake City to San Francisco.
Dave H. Painted side goes up. My website : wnbranch.com
dehusman ...Salt Lake City to San Francisco.
...Salt Lake City to San Francisco.
Not in '71. Not in '72. Not in '73...........
Need to hear from OP on the date(s).
i'm thinking to build in modern times like the late 70 till now
In the late 1970s, I road Amtrak's Desert Wind from Omaha to LA. It was a combined train which was divided at Ogden. One half went to the Bay Area on Southern Pacific rails. I think that was the California Zephyr. The Desert Wind took UP's Line through Utah, Las Vegas, and the southern California desert to Los Angeles.
I think the train from Omaha to Denver was on Burlington Northern rails. From Denver it went north to join the UP mainline west of Cheyene. Now I think that train is routed on the old Denver and Rio Grande Western through Moffet Tunnel although when I took that train about five years ago, track maintenance forced Amtrak to reroute the train over the same route I had taken about 40 years earlier which was a major disappointment.
UP has since absorbed both the SP and D&RGW so any part of their route from Denver west to either LA or the Bay Area could have Amtrak on UP rails. If you model the earlier period. You would need to limit yourself to either the Denver to Ogden leg or the Ogden to LA route. These would be appropriate for either the earlier period or the present.
7j43kFor example, the Amtrak Pioneer: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pioneer_(train) was operated from 1977 to 1997, and it ran on the Union Pacific from Portland to Salt Lake City.
In 1991 the Pioneer's connection to the Zephyr was moved from SLC to Denver via the UP Overland route thru Wyoming.
At first, I was going to chime in with "the Sunset Limited" but, the Yellow Peril didn't arrive until 1996, and it is part of your primary interest. Still, the Sunset was pulled by the entire gamut of Amtrak's main passenger diesels. When I first arrived in Texas in 1978, steam generator equipped SDP-40Fs did the honors. Much of the car fleet was high level ex Santa Fe stock requiring boiler equipped locomotives. When the SDP-40Fs bit the dust, GE P30CHs took over. They were eventually converted to head end power as new rolling stock was aquired by Amtrak. Occasionally an F40PH would be trailing in the consist with the big GE's.
When the P32 whatever they are (Pepsi cans, to many) came onto the scene, they could often be found in a trailing unit position. The introduction of the system wide employment of the snub-nosed P40s eliminated the boom-box F40s and sent the Pepsi cans elsewhere. Nothing like being at the Del Rio depot in the warm, humid, silence of a Sunday morning and listening to a pair of "Pooches" blasting away from a station stop/crew change with 12 cars. Seemed like you could hear that GE bark for five a good five minutes, as they went west. As I said, in 1996, the Yellow Peril arrived.
Also of note, since the Sunset, (SP's and Amtrak's numbers one, and two) was a New Orleans and sometimes Jacksonville to Los Angeles run, it often carried private equipment as well as operating with as many as six material handling cars and I believe, Road-Railers.
When/if the Pooches ever come out in HO, I might have to get a couple of numbers I had a close personal relationship with.
You could model an HO Scale layout set in North Texas, as AMTK and UP cross paths in Fort Worth.
What time frame are you modeling?
The Texas Eagle runs on the MP/UP from St Louis to Ft Worth, then they get on the ATSF/BNSF and run from Tower 55 to Temple, Tx, then gets back on the MP/UP and runs t Taylor Tx and then to San Antonio.
In addition to what Mr Husman has said, the Texas Eagle and the Sunset Ltd both use SP's (sorry, Amtrak's) Sunset Station in San Antonio. San Antonio is where the former MP route between Ft. Worth and Laredo crossed the former SP Sunset Route but, the Eagle terminates while the Sunset continues on its way from New Orleans to LA. The Eagle's single unit used to get turned on the turntable at the former SP engine terminal, a few blocks from the station. There was no swapping of cars, with the Eagle's consist laying over and being serviced at the depot.
Both, the Sunset Route and the UP's former Laredo line are both busy freight routes, even today. As throughout the country, power for both trains are P40/42s.
It should be fairly easy to download a UP map and an amtrak map from Google or yahoo images and compare them
ndbprr It should be fairly easy to download a UP map and an amtrak map from Google or yahoo images and compare them
The problem is the UP map has expanded over the time frame the OP was speaking of. He's talking about a period of over 40 years. If he wants to strive for prototype fidelity but still run equipment that spans that period, he needs to limit himself to only those UP routes that have been in existence for the entire time frame. I think Amtrak might have canceled some routes as well during that same time frame but I'm less sure about that. It seems to me the best option would be the Ogden-LA leg of the UP. I believe Amtrak has run over that line for the entire time period. It might be the only part of the UP route that has had Amtrak for the entire timeframe. Southern Pacific still ran the route west of Ogden toward the Bay Area for much of the period specified. Amtrak now runs west of Denver on the old D&RGW route which has been absorbed by the UP. As I mentioned in a previous post, Amtrak sometimes gets rerouted north from Denver to the UP line through Wyoming. I don't know how frequently that happens, but that is also an option.
Ogden might be an interesting starting point for a layout as it was where westbound traffic would split up between those taking the northern route to California and those going south toward LA. I know the Amtrak train split there. I'm less familiar with the freight operations.
John-NYBW I think Amtrak might have canceled some routes as well during that same time frame but I'm less sure about that.
Well, there's the Pioneer, mentioned earlier.
John-NYBWOgden might be an interesting starting point for a layout as it was where westbound traffic would split up between those taking the northern route to California and those going south toward LA. I know the Amtrak train split there. I'm less familiar with the freight operations.
I thought that Amtrak always made a stop in Salt Lake City, even when they went over UP thru Wyoming they made a jog down to SLC. Wasn't the split made there? I know after ATK started running over D&RGW (1883?) the split was at SLC.
MidlandMike John-NYBW Ogden might be an interesting starting point for a layout as it was where westbound traffic would split up between those taking the northern route to California and those going south toward LA. I know the Amtrak train split there. I'm less familiar with the freight operations. I thought that Amtrak always made a stop in Salt Lake City, even when they went over UP thru Wyoming they made a jog down to SLC. Wasn't the split made there? I know after ATK started running over D&RGW (1883?) the split was at SLC.
John-NYBW Ogden might be an interesting starting point for a layout as it was where westbound traffic would split up between those taking the northern route to California and those going south toward LA. I know the Amtrak train split there. I'm less familiar with the freight operations.
I'm going from memory but I'm pretty sure the train I rode in the late 1970s split at Ogden. Maybe that has changed since Amtrak has shifted their route west of Denver to go through the Moffet Tunnel to Salt Lake City. When I rode the California Zephyr about 6-7 years ago, we were rerouted to the old Amtrak route through Wyoming. I remember going through Salt Lake City but I can't remember if we split there or Ogden. I'm going to check Amtrak timetables to see if the California Zephyr goes through Ogden or not.
UPDATE: According to this, the Desert Wind was discontinued in 1997 so there no longer is a splitting of the train in Utah.
Amtrak - Desert Wind (trainweb.org)
It heads due west out of SLC. The Zephyr is no longer scheduled to pass through Ogden since it now takes a more southern route from Denver to SLC. That would be one more thing for the OP to consider when selecting a location. I can't think of anyplace in which Amtrak rode UP rails both in the late 1970s and the present. He's going to have to choose a tighter time frame or use modeler's license to expand where Amtrak was on UP rails for his entire specified timeframe.
Texas Del Rio Sub-Division. Amtrak gets priority over UP, and if UP delays Amtrak they get fined.
I was a dispatcher for that subdivision many years ago.
chipset35 Texas Del Rio Sub-Division. Amtrak gets priority over UP, and if UP delays Amtrak they get fined. I was a dispatcher for that subdivision many years ago.
I rode the Amtrak from Chicago to the Bay Area about 6 or 7 years ago and we had several slow order stretches through Nevada where we seemed to just crawl along. This delayed our arrival time by several hours. We had also been rerouted from the Moffet Tunnel route through Colorado to the original Amtrak route through Wyoming and Ogden. Our conductor told us UP looks upon Amtrak as a PITA, my term, not his. They do only what they are required to do in order to accomodate Amtrak.
chipset35if UP delays Amtrak they get fined.
They don't really get "fined", they get money if they run them on time, they don't get that money it they are delayed.