North Platte or Bust: Part 8, North Platte

Bailey Yard, North Platte, NE

MONDAY AUG. 13, 2012

O'Fallons, NE

We spent the night in North Platte but our first mission on this

O'Fallons, NE

Monday morning was to go touch the Mountain Time Zone a few miles to the west.  This had nothing to do with railfanning but took us past O'Fallons where the Powder River traffic joins the main line.  This is essentially the other end of the 3 track main.

O'Fallons, NE

O'Fallons, NE

On the way back we encountered a train sitting on the
embankment of a relatively new flyover track.  As we got out to photograph it, it began to move.
This was not far west of the actual wye at O'Fallons.



Once the train was by we headed for Bailey Yard and the Golden Spike Tower in North Platte.  This was the reason we headed into Nebraska in the first place.  It was worth the effort.  There is a nice museum at the foot of the tower and an elevator takes you to two observation decks - one open and one enclosed.  From there you can see Bailey Yard, the largest rail yard in the world.  There are some incredible statistics on the yard which I'll spare you here.  Suffice it to say, the view was awesome.

Bailey Yard, North Platte, NE

Bailey Yard, North Platte, NE

Bailey Yard, North Platte, NE

Bailey Yard, North Platte, NE

CSX Power

Slugs!

Bailey Yard, North Platte, NE

Bailey Yard, North Platte, NE

Bailey Yard, North Platte, NE

Bailey Yard, North Platte, NE

Challenger

Eventually it was time to leave Bailey

Centennial

Yard.  We moved across town to Cody Park where historical equipment was on display.  There was a Challenger and a Centennial to look over.  It was a small but excellent collection.  I liked the unique UP flavor of it.

Cody Park, North Platte, NE

Cody Park, North Platte, NE

RPO Car

Cody Park, North Platte, NE

Cody Park, North Platte, NE

Cody Park, North Platte, NE

Three track mainline.  Brady, NE

When we finished here we grabbed some lunch and headed to the

Brady, NE - new pedestrian overpass

overpass at Brady, just east of town.  Here we could look down on the 3 track main.  It turned out to be fairly busy too so my lunch was nearly cold when I got back to it.

Brady, NE - new pedestrian overpass

Brady, NE - new pedestrian overpass

Brady, NE - new pedestrian overpass

The overpass was pretty good except for the chain link fence.  When we arrived a local guy drove his riding mower over the whole ramp system, so you could tell it was fairly wide.  Kids drove their bikes by us.  Not a bad photo advantage for such empty land. 

Ravenna, NE

Ravenna, NE

We were going to detour from US 30 to visit the BNSF Powder River line at Ravenna on the way back.  This spot is a crew change point and features an office and extensive employee housing.  I'd had great luck at this spot in the past, but not today.  One wb train was sitting at the office and soon an eb stopped on the edge of town.  But, that was it.  We had a long way to go yet that day so we moved on.  We stood on a new highway bridge, but the chain link was not friendly to cameras.

Ravenna, NE

I took what shots I could of our one train before it left.  This can be a hopping place.  It just wasn't at this moment while we were here.  We followed the line back to Grand Island and didn't really encounter much that we could photograph.  We did see a couple of trains held up at the single track UP overpass.  No noise on the scanner didn't help.  We decided to move on.  Time to head south for a while.

Hastings, NE

Hastings was our next stop.  This is on the CB&Q Denver line out of Lincoln.  It has a reasonable amount of traffic and sees the Zephyr in the late at night and the wee hours of the morning.  Across the street from the depot is this building proclaiming that Hastings is the birthplace of Kool-Aid.  East of town was an extensive military ordinance storage facility that once had a web of track.  Some of the bunkers now had trees on them.




We were headed for Manhattan, KS by way of Marysville, KS but our light was failing faster than we were making progress.  We hit the grid of side roads to find the UP.  "Short range sensors" kept showing tracks that were long gone.  We headed for the town of Ong.  The BN must have pulled the tracks and left the town to dry up and blow away.  It looked abandoned but was not.

 Davenport, NE (just south of Ong)

Farther south we found the town of Davenport.  Here is where we sat at a crossing and waited for the Marysville Sub to come to life.  A local farmer stopped and asked if something was coming (common question along the UP). 

 Davenport, NE (just south of Ong)

We had a friendly chat before it was time for him to go on.  Eventually our wait was rewarded.





Our adventure did not end at Davenport, even though our cameras were finished for the day.  We did get into the towns of Fairbury and Marysville where the scanner came to life.  We were to make it to my friend Jim's place in Manhattan for the night so after Marysville it was time to call.  We passed a lot of granger trackage that "short range sensors" showed but nothing was left.  Out here the missing tracks were CB&Q, MoPac, Rock and UP.  We also passed sections of Kansas' only narrow gauge, but I couldn't spot them.


In the morning we would be chasing UP 844 with Jim's guidance.

BC

Marysville Sub, Davenport, NE (just south of Ong)

North Platte or Bust: Part 7, Nebraska

SUNDAY AUG. 12, 2012

When we left KC on Sunday 8/12, we pretty much chose the fastest route to North Platte.  That meant heading north to Nebraska City and west to I-80.  All roads are fast in this part of the world so that was easy.  We wanted to follow the UP transcontinental route from Grand Island to North Platte along US 30.  This would take us by Gibbon Jct. where the line from KC comes in and forms a 3 track main to North Platte and O'Fallons. We passed many lines radiating out of KC and Omaha.  Some were busy and some were long gone.  The GPS "short range sensors" kept showing tracks that were no longer in place.  The Rand McNalley Railroad Atlas was the best we could do this far west. 

Grand Island, NE

Grand Island, NE

Once in Grand Island, NE we simply had to seek the point where the BNSF crosses the UP.  This is a single track overpass that is roughly 10 years old now.  The line used to cross at grade but with Powder River coal traffic on both lines, the bottlenecks would have been a disaster.  BNSF is even now seeking to double track this overpass because it is becoming a bottleneck.  The next day we would see two trains stacked up waiting to use it. 

Grand Island, NE

Grand Island, NE

Grand Island, NE

The UP was curiously quiet when we arrived but that didn't last forever.  We got a steady stream of coal loads heading east on the BNSF while we waited.  Eventually we even got one train passing over another.  The lead units were not synchronized but the trailing DPU's were close enough to see each other. 

Grand Island, NE

Grand Island, NE

The UP then provided a couple of westbounds, though the yard seemed active too, just out of sight.  The coal train's trailing DPU had a door swinging in the breeze, and we played tag with that train most of the way to North Platte.

Grand Island, NE

Grand Island, NE

Grand Island, NE

WB Gibbon Jct., NE

EB DPU Gibbon Jct., NE

 Our next target west was Gibbon Jct.  This is where the Marysville line from Kansas City joins the transcontinental line.  Depending on your perspective, this is where the 3 track mainline begins or ends.  Coal traffic has caused the UP to double track the Marysville Sub and add the 3rd track to the transcontinental line. 

Gibbon Jct., NE

KCS unit Gibbon Jct., NE

We saw a continuous barrage of trains in the short time we sat at the crossing there.  Something on every line.  The westbounds we saw coming as we arrived from the east, all seemed to be held at the junction for a short time.  SP and KCS made appearances.  I think we stayed less than an hour.



Down the road to the west we ran into the city of Kearny to see what we could see.  The original

Local power, Kearney, NE

depot is now gone but UP has one of their yellow brick square offices near there.  Down the tracks along a parkway we found some local power idling.




We didn't linger in Kearney and headed west.  Here we encountered the curious town of Cozad.  The depot was in an attractive little park now

The 100th Meridian - Cozad, NE

and everything highlighted the fact that the 100th Meridian passes through here.  In fact, there was a commemorative plaque for the ceremony when the construction of the Transcontinental Railroad reached Cozad.  UP also provided a caboose to the park. 

The 100th Meridian - Cozad, NE

West of Gothenberg, NE

Along the 3 track line we noticed that the small towns had elaborate, and new, pedestrian overpasses.  They seemed to be of a common design.  As it became apparent that these might be useful, we scoped one out for future use.   When we passed the town of Gothenburg the sunlight looked like it might fail soon and it was time to find a crossing to watch the action from.  We found a very isolated crossing as it turned out.

West of Gothenberg, NE

West of Gothenberg, NE

We had grabbed some Subway sandwiches in Cozad so it was time to eat too.  We saw several trains and a meet while we parked at that isolated crossing.    The sunset made for some spectacular lighting.

A couple of crossings west of Gothenberg, NE

We ended the day pretty much as planned.  We had passed grain elevators from tiny to unit train sized.  We'd passed ammonia plant and ethanal plants.  All manner of plains agribusiness.  US 30 proved to be ideal for our travels.  We were near enough to North Platte to call it a day and we had scoped out the overpass in Brady for our return.  Now all we had to do was retire.   One of my last shots turned out to be pretty good for someone who generally avoids the artsie-fartsie stuff

A couple of crossings west of Gothenberg, NE

BC