The information on why the 762 was on the ICE is interesting Alec. I never did hear why it was there until now.
Nice stuff with the new Camera, Jordan! You'll get used to the new 4 x 6 format. I had the same problem when I started with a DSLR, and I did a lot of cropping at first. But after a while it becomes normal. Now, for me going back to a 5x7 camera seems odd...
Neat shot Tyler! I always like streak shots...
Well, I'm officially off for Christmas Break after yesterday. Not sure how much railfanning I'll get in in the next month, but it's nice just to be able to be around home again without anything that has to be done...
Noah
Pardon the double post, but I have a few pictures to share.
A few days ago I came to the realization that I'd be done for the semester at Platteville at 10am Wednesday morning. The gears started turning in my twisted little mind, and a plot was born. A check of the weather revealed that it was supposed to be a nice sunny day, and so despite the cold temperatures I decided that I needed to give myself an "end of the semester" present and make the drive to Dubuque before I left (it's only about 25 minutes away). A perfect day would include an Iowa, Chicago, and Eastern train showing up about the same time I did that I could chase to Bellevue and finally nail that overlook shot. I finished up on schedule (after my dreaded chemistry final which wasn't even that bad), and after gathering my supplied I headed to the car with the hope of making it down to Dubuque by about 10:30ish.I headed for the River and decided to start at East Dubuque, IL, across the river from Dubuque. As I was traveling through the hills the scanner started crackling with somebody on the ICE channel - always a good sign! However, it turned out to be a northbound that was making a pick up and was now continuing North. I was hoping he'd have a meet to make, but the dispatcher gave no mention of that when he gave him a warrant, just the mention of another Northbound behind. Oh well. I decided to stick with the plan of starting in East Dubuque since a northbound isn't that well lit anyway.I got to East Cabin (a railroad location in East Dubuque) and the scanner came to life again, this time on the CN channel. A MOW foreman was giving permission to somebody through his limits around what sounded like Milepost 190, but where is Milepost 190? I wrote it off, figuring anything coming near me would have to talk to the BNSF anyway. CN trains use the BNSF from Galena for about 15 miles up to East Dubuque where the used a curved tunnel as an approach to the Mississippi River Bridge. There's only a few trains a day on the former IC line, but if they do appear they have to talk to the BNSF dispatcher so they are easy to find.
I found an oddity sitting just south of Cabin, a GREX slot train. I love the locomotive, which looks like a heavily modified EMD switcher:
The BNSF was pretty quiet except for a maintainer on main one who was replacing a joint bar in the plant at East Cabin. I had kind of been waiting for that second northbound ICE train to show up, when about 11:30 he finally did. He got a new warrant to Dubuque Junction, and then called up the CN dispatcher for permission (The ICE has to run over join trackage in Dubuque that is controlled by the CN dispatcher. Basically around this town everybody has to run over somebody else's railroad to get around, except for the BNSF). "Well, I've lined up for an eastbound right now, so we'll just have to wait and see" the dispatcher replied. An eastbound, eh? Time to get over the river to Dubuque! I headed across and found a GP38 type engine working the CN yard. Nothing was in site on the main (as the ICE train told the ICE dispatcher as well). I did a little exploring of the city to get my bearings, and in a little bit the CN 5245 called the Dubuque yard office. Somebody answered, and the train crew replied "Is this the outbound crew on this ethanol train?" "Yep it is," came the reply. Cool! By the time I got back to the CN yard office he was already pulled up to the depot and the new crew was getting out. I hopped over the river, and after deciding the tunnel shot wouldn't be lit well enough I chose to try a shot of the train crossing the Mississippi River Bridge. I figured it wouldn't be long before he'd leave, but I forgot that this was a class one crew - it took them about 45 minutes to get going. Finally though they called the BN and the DS told them to come on over. Finally, a train to shoot:
Yep, that just made the trip worth it! Not a bad consist with that GTW geep in there. I hopped back into the car and hurried over to East Cabin, which is a slightly shorter trip for me than it is for the train (thanks to that curved tunnel into the hillside). I made it just about the time he was coming out of the tunnel, and got another shot at East Cabin as he crossed over from main one to main two.
I was surprised when I returned to the car to hear a detector going off on the BNSF south of town: this guy wasn't far enough to be over the detector yet. But as he cleared I could see a train stopped down around the corner, and he had an NS leader too! I set up for a northbound shot, but was surprise when, after a couple of minutes, he was still sitting in the same place. Something was a foot. I went down to see what the train was, and well, I'll leave the description at: Holy Consist Batman! Even though that ICE northbound was getting across the CN, he'd be badly lit anyway and so I decided to stay on this side of the river. I went back to set up for my northbound shot (I wasn't going to miss this guy), when the detector on main two went off again. Apparently the dispatcher had decided to run a Z train around the manifest here. Nice leader, though too bad the light wasn't better:With him out of the way the Manifest soon got a yellow light to follow the Z north. I moved a few feet down for a shot of the consist of the day:Say farewell to our western visitors:These are the three MRL units that were leased to the INRD and and spent quite a bit of time roaming back and forth across the CP from Indiana to Minneapolis. I had heard that the MRL units were stored on the INRD, but I had no idea they were being returned from their lease (at least I assume that's what's happening here). And being led by two NS units was nice too.I figured there would be very little that could top that, I but I decided to stay put and see what would develop. It turned out not much. There was no sign of an ICE southbound like I'd hoped, and it turned out to be a dead period on the BNSF. Once and a while I'd heard the CN yard job (L58691-16 according to what he said on the radio), but even he was pretty quiet. I'd seen a sign in Dubuque about the welcome center offering WiFi access, so I though I'd go see about pulling up the ATCS monitor to see if anything was coming on the BN.
Unfortunately there were liars, as there was no good connection to be had. I though I'd wasted my time in coming over the river when the L586 called the CN dispatcher about doing an "in and out" at Dubuque Junction to switch some industries near the approach to the bridge. They spent around a half hour or so switching a couple of industries, and came back to the yard with cars on either side of the engine. Before entering the yard he stopped to do a run around move and get them all on the south side of the engine. With the way the run around is laid out, this worked out really well for me, as they had to detach from both sets of cars allowing for a couple of shots from other angles:I hung around for a little bit longer yet to see what was happening, but it wasn't much. I think this same crew (as they called themselves the Dubuque Road Switcher) toned up the BNSF a little bit later with the BNSF unit wanting to come over the river to the center siding at East Cabin. Now just where had these guys come from? I hurried over to the other side with the hope of seeing what was going on (and maybe they'd be coming back with a train). It turned out just to be a light GE ES44 (one I had seen parked in the IC yard earlier), and the shot I got isn't worth posting It sounded like the unit had been bad ordered and they were returning it. They tied the unit down in the center siding and the crew got in a truck to go back over the river, so there went the hope of another bridge shot. The sun was about to go behind the bluffs and was already being filtered by some clouds (it really is miserable loosing light at 3:30ish), so I decided to call it a day and head back to Platteville to pack up and head for home sweet home. Of course, no sooner did I get about 10 miles away than an eastbound BNSF train called up that he was at Dubuque and the DS replied he'd have to wait for two west.... oh well. I consider it to have been a worthwhile trip, even though I didn't catch anything on the ICE, especially considering I only had to travel about 20 miles out of my way. The bridge shot is one I've been meaning to cross off my list for quite a while anyway, and now I can say I have. The Bellevue shot will just have to wait until spring.
Enjoy the pictures!Noah
Great pictures Noah! Nice catch with the MRL units! I remember Dubuque, that was the town that was impossible to find your way around in...
(Oh, and nice catch with the Pre-Production GEVO, BNSF 5743)
My Youtube Channel: http://www.youtube.com/user/JR7582 My Flickr Photos: http://www.flickr.com/photos/wcfan/
TrainManTy You have a lot of computer problems, Joe!
You have a lot of computer problems, Joe!
omg, you have no idea... I should sue Gateway... And it's only a year and a half old...
Actually, it was the charging cord (AGAIN! I have no clue how it happened, but it just stopped working). I ordered another one (this will be my fourth!), and it was shipped, so hopefully I'll have it either tomorrow or Monday...Besides the cord, the computer itself has its own problems, too...
My Model Railroad: Tri State RailMy Photos on Flickr: FlickrMy Videos on Youtube: YoutubeMy Photos on RRPA: RR Picture Archives
Thanks, Jordan. Dubuque is a really confusing city. I set out to find the hobby shop once during a lull in trains. I looked it up on a map and knew about where it should be, and yet after around twenty minutes of driving I never did find University avenue...
I would have never known that was a preproduction GEVO either until you pointed it out. I guess to me a GEVO is like every other GEVO...*yawn*....
I'm currently typing on my parent's Gateway that's still going strong after about 6 years. Only thing we've really had to do to it is change the on/off button, but otherwise it's run well all these years. It's kinda slow, but that's not Gateway's fault: it's just old technology that needs upgrading.
Well yesterday i decided to go railfan since it has been over a month since i been out. we only had a half day of school so i figured why not go out before the weather gets bad. we got rain & freezing rain today & more rain tomorrow & snow saturday.
i went to Stevens Point
heres what i saw nothing exciting
ok maybe exciting
well i missed X346 coming into point i got there & somone was behind me & i couldnt turn in time to the wood st rental so once jazdewski dialed the rtc & rtc said he would be following 588 out of the yard well 588 took for ever to get out of the yard so i go to orchard as i never photoed there before & get 588
i didnt want to wait for X346 cuz i wanted a shot in amherst, well i checked out Lake Emily rd eh ok but not what i wanted, then the jct but i the closest i could park was a ways & i would have to walk a ways & freeze so i have to go to the other side of town because in Amherst they have no crossings they have bridges. so i end up by the bridge over the siding.
well i made a wrong move & went to a different spot to get 346 & the pic turned out bad. should of stayed at the bridge but my scanner died, plus i was back to my rubber duck antenna since my other once busted off. wouldn't of been able to hear a horn or see the SB light on the other end of the siding.
well hope you all have a good Holiday.
Merry Christmas!
I'm seriously impressed by my new camera's video quality! Here's a video from Boston last week.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BJmgBCPy_gg
Also, I went to NYC yesterday, so I'll be posting a bunch of photos and a video soon!
That quality is stunning!
My dad's camera's isn't bad, but not nearly as good as yours! But it's WAY better than the other camera...
Here's the Santa Train, shot using that camera. I had to stand on the wrong side of the tracks, since the train arrived at the same time as we did, so I had no time to cross the tracks and set up the tripod:Santa Train 2009
The consist was (and I was able to get the car numbers from the video, since that was 100% impossible with the old camera...): 4024 4113 6509 5209 6752 6787 6072 6530 6786 6544 6023 (PL42AC, F40PH-2CAT, 9 Comet Vs). All NJT equipment, except the 67XX cars, which are Metro-North.
There's some photos taken by the NRHS of the train, as well as a video of the barbershop quartet.
On Monday, we played a game in the Prudential Center in Newark (on the Devils' practice rink). You could see the NEC from where we unloaded the bus. When we got there, I saw a SB Comet/46 set, a NB Northeast Regional (with one car wrapped for some kind of advertising...), and a SB Keystone. On the way out, I also saw two SB Arrow sets, a SB ML set, and a SB Acela (SB is outbound, NB is inbound). On the way to the rink, I was also able to grab a phone shot of the massive DOCK lift bridge (Tyler knows how huge it is!). If I remember, I'll post that later.
Have a great day!!!
ns3010On the way to the rink, I was also able to grab a phone shot of the massive DOCK lift bridge (Tyler knows how huge it is!).
Yeah...it's huge! It's actually the world's largest multi-level lift bridge - although I don't think it ever opens anymore.
http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=1582847
I was actually able to see it from the Empire State Building yesterday! I'll post some photos from my NYC trip sometime this week.
No, I'm 99.9999999999999% sure it still opens. It is definately still manned, so it would be really strange if it didn't open. It doesn't happen often, but I'm pretty sure it happens. (And at least it's not like PORTAL, which gets stuck open every other day... no wonder why they're working on replacing it in the near future, around the same time as the completion of ARC)Here's the bridge from Monday. Keep in mind that it's from about a half mile away... And dang, that bus window is REALLY dirty!:
TrainManTyI was actually able to see it from the Empire State Building yesterday
Oh, and BTW, the first two 46As, 4629 and 4630, arrived last week. The 29 is out in Pueblo for testing, and the 30 will test here, before the other 34 of them arrive from Germany over the next two years. And then as soon as all of those arrive, the ALP-45DPs will start coming over!
EDIT to accomodate Brent's post: I got some rolling stock for my layout, although only one can currently be used (the heavyweight is too long for my curves, until I rebuild by layout, and the centerbeam is broken, so I'll send that back next week). I also got some paint, and I was supposed to get decal paper, but Walthers forgot to put it in the box, even though it was included in the shipping list...For non-train stuff, I got skates and a new stick. I need to go to the pro shop and get the skates heat fitted to my feet. They also need a sharpening, since the blades are about as sharp as an apple... I'll probably do this tomorrow, since I doubt I'll have time before practice on Sunday...EDIT #2: Forgot, I also got a shirt from my cousin. He has a clothing company, and this shirt is so sick!
Well I should probably post these...
Everybody have a great Holiday Season!
As for gifts, well I got a wonderful book written by Steve Glischinski called "Regional Railroads of the Midwest. (I think I met Mr. Glischinski up in White Pine back in March) I also got a mono-pod for my Camera, a camera bag, and some gift cards to buy an extra battery, lens filter, ect...that was it for gifts that had to do with rail fanning.
Merry Christmas, everybody. I had a pretty good Christmas, and I hope yours was likewise!
I remember traveling over that bridge in Newark on the way into and out of NYC each day when we visited there a little over a year ago. We stayed in Newark, though because we were using public transit I never got a chance to try and get pictures of the bridge. It is quite the structure though!
I ended up with a bunch of Model Railroad stuff for Christmas as well, all buildings for the new layout: a couple of houses (Walthers and Atlas), an Atlas Roundhouse, and a Dominoes pizza restaurant. Plus the usual assortment of cash.
Edit: 'Tis a good book Jordan, I'm sure you'll enjoy it. I've had the pleasure of meeting Mr. Glischinski a couple of times, he's a nice fellow. And he certainly has one heck of a collection of pictures and information.