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I recently made a road trip up to Spokane Washington from Portland Oregon. The whole trip paralleled the BNSF and UP mainlines through the northwest. Only recently has my intrest and love for trains been rekindled, so like and good railfan I just sat there and stared out the window watching the trains. I was dissapointed. I grew up in fremont, california, on what is today the UP warm springs subdivision. No intense train action around there, in fact I don't have any idea if it was a branch line mainline, or what it really was meant for. But the UP and SP tracks travelled right through town. When I was young it was so exciting the see all the different power roll through. I sometimes got to see some tough SD40-2 consists, occasionally a good on Rio Grande GP40, sometimes I'd see a gp20, or even an old sd9 running long hood forward. I saw SW1200's, I was excited when I saw new SD60's and the like. I got to see SPSF kodachromes, my favorite, sometimes cotton belt units would roll through, the occasinal Dash-8 on the UP. It was always an excitement waiting to see what kind of power was behind that bright light coming towards me. But travelling along the mainlines today, I was bored. Dash-8W, yawn. Occasionally I might see an old SD40-2 soldiering on, that was a treat. I saw swaths of SD70M's on UP, not bad. And ofcourse the complete infestation of Dash-9W's on both roads. That was about all I ever saw, those 4 locos. The most exciting find I saw was a white face GP38 pulling a work train for BNSF, that was a real exciting moment. So what's my point? Whatever happened to variety? I was honestly bored seeing Dash 9 after Dash 9, even if it was an AC4400 or something it still looks basically the same, same cab design etc. And the paint is all basically the same, a bunch of pumkins or a bunch of lemons. No longer do I wait at the crossing with anticipation, I figure it'll just be another GE clone. I'd be blown away to see C30, or a GP40 roll by, or at least something not on 6 trucks with a wide cab. I was excited to see that on some of the redesigned SD90's the cab style was changed a little, finally some variety! I guess I am just posting this to see if anyone else feels the same way as I do, with only 4 major railroads nowadays, and herds of GE clones wandering the rails, do you feel like the good old days of loco-watching are fleeting fast? Maybe it's that with the older machines it seemed like all the different locos had personalities, the mean n' tough looking SD40, the short and stout GP30. The ominous high hood GP9's. The noble SD40 "snoot" noses. The big but friendly SD50's and 60's, the baby SW1200's. The can-do attitude of the little GP20's. The rugged and mountain looking RioGrande SD40T2s, the bright and friendly Kodachromes, the minority but still proud Cotton Belt. Anybody get it? I don't feel like the newer locos, especially the GE's have much personality. When you see an AC4400 you should make you feel intimidated by the power, instead I think "hmmm, looks just like any other fat faced GE, yawn." I'll always be a railfan, but I sure wish somebody would change the design of these things a little every new model, kind of like a car, or I wi***he roads would have more specially painted units , so I don't spend more time looking at the different types of boxcars than I do looking at the power. Anybody else feel this way?
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