Thread: They do it big over here in the US

If you go to Omaha or Cheyenne, have a look at the Union Pacific Big Boys displayed in parks in both cities. The Big Boy that was in Pomona is now up at the UP yards in Cheyenne for restoration and eventual use in the UP steam fleet.

Tote,

Haven't yet been to North America, but in a recent trip to Europe, stayed in a hotel right on the Rhine and saw huge quantities of freight (and passengers) moved by rail.
Unlike North America, the trains tend to be shorter and lighter but they make up for that by running them very frequently. There were two line on either side of the Rhine and each line would have had a train on it every 10 minutes I reckon.
And they travel FAST! 100 to 120 kilometers per hour I'd estimate.

Many trains carry semi trailers (minus the prime mover), so they obviously take a lot of trucks off the road, which is great for other road, users, great for the environment and I presume great for the freight companies, otherwise they wouldn't be doing it!

For some reason, here in Australia, we just don't "get" the concept of railways. We seem wedded to road transport, fail to invest in rail networks, run them inefficiently (the Pilbara rail lines are an exception) and assume that rail is always less efficient than road for anything other than high volume bulk commodities over long distances.
So are the Yanks and the Europeans stupid, or is it US??

Oh, and on one of the busiest air routes in the WORLD (Melbourne, Sydney, Brisbane) we stuff around debating the viability of high speed rail when the rest of the world just goes ahead and does it and reaps the benefits. Benefits like not having to build a second airport in Sydney perhaps at a huge financial and political expense.

Sorry to hijack your post, Tote, but doing what you're doing really opens your eyes to how WE could do things better. Pity our politicians couldn't see what you're seéing and learn a thing or two.

Alan

Couple of years ago I was heading north on I29 St. Jo-Council Bluffs and started to overtake a grain train on the parallel rail line. I was doing the speed limit and very slowly overtook the train. I should have counted wagons but didn't. It was enormous. Another time I watched a BNSF coal train pull out of the yards in Harden, MT. It was 134 wagons and they are probably 40-50% bigger than the coal wagons we use here. I really was impressed by what the yanks call possum belly wagons that take double deck 40' containers, four to a wagon, in trains that seem miles long.

Way back in 2007 I remember sitting on the veranda of the Parachilna Hotel watching the Leigh Creek coal train going by, the information sign over the road said

..................... The Leigh Creek coal train passes through Parachilna and has 161 carriagesand 3 engines and is 2.8kms long, ..............................

one rattled by as I drank my beer.

Beat that 'Yanks'.


Deano

We weren't going far enough north on this trip to look at the big boys in Wyoming but I did find one parked at Frisco in Texas. Unfortunately the museum is closed on Tuesdays and the bit where the Locos are isn't open yet. Took a couple of photos through the fence before I was questioned by an ever vigilant retiree from the complex next door who decided that the family in the Jeep must have been up to no good.







Regards,
Tote

Originally Posted by DeanoH

Way back in 2007 I remember sitting on the veranda of the Parachilna Hotel watching the Leigh Creek coal train going by, the information sign over the road said

..................... The Leigh Creek coal train passes through Parachilna and has 161 carriagesand 3 engines and is 2.8kms long, ..............................

one rattled by as I drank my beer.

Beat that 'Yanks'.


Deano

I bet it wasn't being pulled at 75mph though. I was doing the speed limit on the I , 80mph, and took forever to catch and pass the train.

Originally Posted by Rurover

Many trains carry semi trailers (minus the prime mover), so they obviously take a lot of trucks off the road, which is great for other road, users, great for the environment and I presume great for the freight companies, otherwise they wouldn't be doing it!

When I used to work in the signal boxes in the Blue Mountains, there was a service between Perth and Sydney that did that. The trailers weren't on flat bed railcars.

They were like these road-railers:

A picture of the US container rail wagons:




Further to Brian's post about the speed that these trains do, the two pictures were taken 3 minutes apart and we were doing 80 Miles an hour.

Back of the train:


Front of the train:



Another train later in the day trying to get as much as possible in the frame with a 50mm lens:




Regards,
Tote