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This photo was taken from East Stroudsburg tower on November 24, 1978. A loaded unit coal train for PP&L's Portland power plant has just passed through town. The East Stroudsburg local (just an ex-EL GP7 and a caboose) takes the siding. The units in the foreground are the helpers that shoved the train over the Pocono grades from Scranton. This is one of last, if not the last, coal train over the Lackawanna main line until January 1997. In just one month this line will be abandoned. |
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This photo, taken with a borrowed Instamatic camera on a scorching July 7, 1979, shows a westbound TrailVan train behind four GP40-2's blasting unassisted around the Horseshoe Curve. This photo also shows a beginner's disregard for the basic rules of photography. The results, however, are pleasing. The sun glints off of the four track rails, and highlights the exhaust blasting out of the locomotives. |
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This photo of restored Amtrak GG-1 4935 was taken on a brutally cold January 16, 1980. 4935 is pulling the southbound Silver Star into 30th Street Station in Philadelphia. Once inside, another G was coupled to the head end for the rest of the journey to Washington. Diesels will haul the train to its final destination in Florida. |
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The Conrail Executive Train is doing its best imitation of the Baltimore and Ohio's National Limited on the Falls Bridge in Fairmont Park in Philadelphia in April of 1993. |
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Brand new General Electric AMD-103 805 poses on the head end of the northbound Crescent at Washington DC on May 16, 1994. The Genesis is about to hand over the Crescent to another GE product, an Amtrak E60, for the rest of the trip to New York City. |
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Just east of CP Burn in Allentown, Pa. on April 6, 1996, Westbound Conrail train ALNS (ALlentown Norfolk Southern) led by Conrail B40-8 5066 crawls toward a signal at Burn. While CSX SD40-2 6228 blasts toward the former Lehigh Valley railroad main line leading a D&H coal train. Soon after the last coal hopper clears, the signal clears and ALNS's units come to life and head off to the Norfolk Southern Interchange at Hagerstown, MD. |
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It's 5:30 PM April 10, 1998, an eastbound TV (TrailVan) train roars past CP MARY approaching a Pennsylvania Railroad engineering triumph, the Rockville Bridge. Built in 1902, Rockville is still the longest stone arch bridge in the world. The TV train's trailers will be available for delivery by the next morning in New Jersey. |
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With its signature loads of GM truck frames from Reading, PA, Train ALPI (ALlentown PIttsburgh) climbs up the East Slope of the Alleghenies past another PRR landmark, MG Tower. MG is isolated in the mountains just west of the Horseshoe Curve. The four SD40-2 helpers pulling and pushing, and C36-7 6639 and SD45-2 6657 are running flat out. The heavy manifest freight train is moving at a ground shaking 10 - 15 miles per hour. Its April 2, 1999, and the end of Conrail is at hand. MG's days are also numbered, within 18 months it too will be gone. |