Union Pacific, I suspect has a love/hate relationship with the former SP Surf/Coast line. Railroading in California is never easy. Even along the ocean. IN SLO, Union Pacific maintains helpers to help trains climb upgrade and make it to Paso Robles and the Salinas Valley. In 2005, 9 years after the merger, UP still kept this disturbingly classic set of SP power in SP paint as the helper set. SD40T-2 8794, SD40R 2659 and SD45R 2758 all patched hold down the fort on a late October midday.
Five years later, on a rainy December 31st 2010, UP has shown just how important this link is. The tired, but classic SP power has been replaced with UP's latest and greatest. A brace of EMD SD70ACe locomotives now hold the Helper district job as seen from the window of the Amtrak Coast Starlight.
Aaarrrrrggggghhhhh! Nice photo. But high places and I don't mix well. Even just sitting here, looking at a photo.
Far from former Pennsy rails, Old Conrail blue starting to show through a quickly weathering home done paint scheme. Stryker, Montana:
Denver and Rio Grande Western This is the same roadbed as my previous post from an overlook near the dam. There is a staircase that takes you from the ridge down to the bottom. Oh to have been from the era when the D&RGW traveled through this canyon. The Needle shot is from this same canyon, just farther down the road. As you might have noticed, Lisa and I spent allot of time this year chasing down old roadbeds; some we videotaped as we drove down them...
Boxcab, the big brother.The engines back then were all coal fired. You had to buy a red scarf to keep the cinders from going down your neck. Still have it. Curtis
an ex UP on Job 32 on the Clinton Sub. One of the two wide-cab units CN had running on L563 in Cedar Rapids. The other wide-cab unit. L563 northbound at Hiawatha, IA
