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Two points of interest. First, living about 150 yds from the spur off of the mainline through Colorado Springs onto Ft. Carson, I can tell you that the primary purpose of military railroads these days is to transport ALL of the vehicles long distances. Practically any mainline leading from a post holding a major COMBAT unit (i.e. Ft. Riley & 1st Infantry, Ft. Carson, 4th ID & 3d ACR, Ft. Hood, 1st Cav & III Corps) is going to see substantial traffic. Up until the beginning of OIF, the main destination was Ft. Irwin, and NTC. These trains were dropped at Yermo, an extension of the Marine Logistics Base in Barstow California. Now days, they are enroute to and from Beaumont, TX, and the port there, where tanks, brads, Humvees, trucks, and containers, etc., are loaded on to the RIRO ships that dock there for transport to the Kuwaiti Naval Base. The consists are almost exclusively DODX marked versions of the TTX series flat cars. Secondly, although I absolutely SUCK at locomotive power nomenclature, there are two engines which sit on post, painted primarily crimson with yellow highlighting and lettering. There design is quite similar to the ones that hauled hoppers through the UP branchlines of western Kansas in the 70s. I'd guess they're either GP30s or something equivalent. OK, so it's three things. The US Army Reserve still maintains a few (read 2-3) Transportation Companies which are Rail based. Since I signed up in 1991, and probably prior to that, there have not been any active duty SOLDIERS on the rails. Instead, the local mainline provides a locomotive to drop the 100+ cars, and the US Army engines shuffle them through the download process at the railhead. Just last week, a BN remarked engine was pulling a load of empties out of Carson back to the main yard in the Springs.
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