So where can a Big Boy go?

Distinguished observers like to point out that Big Boys only ever operated in revenue service on the Union Pacific in select mountain areas, mostly Utah and Wyoming. It was what they were designed to do – all they ever did. A kind of logic dictates the original routings are the only ones Union Pacific Big Boy No. 4014 will ever run again.
So when I visited Union Pacific’s steam boss, Ed Dickens, on the last leg of an official Trains trip to Los Angeles three weeks ago, I asked him, “Where can the 4014 go?”
Dickens didn’t answer my question directly. Instead he pointed me to facts:

Fact: Big Boys are more nimble than you think

All Big Boys are articulated locomotives, but were they good at turning? Kalmbach’s Locomotive Cyclopedia says the Big Boys could make 20-degree curves in terminals, without derailing. Sounds good to me. Sources are sparse for Big Boy axle loadings, but by several estimates, a Big Boy in operation put about 67,500 pounds on each axle and that’s lighter than the esteemed Allegheny-type. Again, according to the Cyclopedia, the famous (and heavier) Allegheny-type locomotives of the Chesapeake & Ohio and the Virginian had axle loadings of up to 80,000 pounds. If the Eastern coal roads could take that abuse way back when, in theory, they could have taken a Big Boy. 

Fact: Big Boys do get around

Big Boy No. 4012 is at Steamtown in Scranton, Pa. No. 4017 is in Green Bay, Wis., No. 4023 is in Omaha, Neb., and No. 4018 just moved to Frisco, Texas, after an extended stay in Dallas.

Oh, and by the way, Big Boys were born of the American Locomotive Co. in New York! New York State, that is, and specifically Schenectady, a proud manufacturing city in New York’s capital region. Schenectady is 800 miles east of Chicago and roughly 1,800 miles east of Cheyenne, Wyo. In the 1940s, the most direct route to move 25 Big Boys westward would have been over the New York Central to Chicago, then by way of Union Pacific to Wyoming.

Rail historians could give more accurate routings for Big Boy comings and goings, but it is safe to say that 70 years ago and today, the world's largest steam locomotives left no permanent damage in the East, or anywhere else.

Fact: You can jack up the tender

The myth goes that the Big Boys’ centipede tenders with their rigid wheel bases kept Big Boys from doing any serious turning in the 1940s and 1950s despite being articulated locomotives. The tenders are the same used now on Union Pacific’s Northern No. 844 and Challenger No. 3985. Ed Dickens says the tenders were designed, or at least work OK, with the tenders’ rear axles jacked, or elevated. Need more clearance? Jack-up another axle.

Fact: U.S. railroads are in better shape than at any time in history

Just consider: In the 1940s, Big Boys and their 16 driving wheels pounded mightily as they ran on jointed or "stick" rail that was generally lighter than the 115-to-155-pound welded rails in use throughout the United States today.

So what’s the answer? Where can Big Boy No. 4014 go when it gets fully overhauled and restored? With determination, No. 4014 will go wherever Union Pacific leadership decides to send it. AND, I learned that seeing a Big Boy in Seattle, Chicago, Atlanta, or anywhere I can imagine is a dream, not a fantasy.