Beer Unit Trains?

[BigJim]

Mudchicken,
The beer tanks from Golden wind up here in the Shenandoah Valley near Elkton, Va. never getting even close to Richmond.

The beer stout is loaded COLD into tank cars that are insulated so well that they will not lose less than a degree of tempurature per day. They are shipped in various size blocks of cars. I've seen as many as fifty one, but this includes DF box cars too. The blocks of cars arrive in a time freight which will set the cars off online.

[Anonymous]

BNSF's Coors train used to be a pretty hot commodity. The Coors tank cars and box cars would come into Kansas City for the NS from the east and from a H MEMKCK train from Memphis to Kansas City KS on the BNSF line. BNSF would put all the beer together from the 2 trains and put UPS piggy backs on the train and run a Z KCMDEN9 from Kansas City to Denver. But BNSF has quit hauling the UPS piggs to Denver and now just runs alot of beer with some mixed other freight now the train is a H KCMDEN9. Even though it is only a H-train is still keeps the number 9 at the end which still means it is some what HOT commodity.

[domefoamer]

Thank goodness for the Coors beer train! No, I never touch the stuff, but this is the only train I can hear from my home in the western suburbs of Denver. I moved out of a part of the the downtown area, which rings with railroad noises, most notably when they start a mile-long coal train and I'd hear the slack slapping out, echoing off the high-rise towers like rolling thunder. The beer train, by contrast, is a meek little thing, never pulling more than a few dozen cars or moving more than a few dozen mph. And tying up traffic on major roads several times a day, but never very long. It seems to take about five minutes for it to mosey past my earshot, blowing its horn in melodious fashion.

[Anonymous]

A couple of questions. For Tree68 what happened to Olympia beer? I remember it from my college days (late'50s) and it was a pretty good brew.
A bigger and more important question is why does NS run the beer train through the rathole south then east then up the Shenandoah valley? Would it not be shorter to run on NS old N&W main line through West Virginia and save a few miles? I do not think double stacking tank cars is done too often so clearance would not be a problem.

[oltmannd]

QUOTE: Originally posted by wrwatkins

A couple of questions.
A bigger and more important question is why does NS run the beer train through the rathole south then east then up the Shenandoah valley? Would it not be shorter to run on NS old N&W main line through West Virginia and save a few miles? I do not think double stacking tank cars is done too often so clearance would not be a problem.

Might be shorter, but it's not cheaper or faster. Traffic routes by lowest impedence on NS (think fewer handlings, lower cost yards) and train service is set up for optimized network flow, not "best" route for each individual car.