Mission Tower memories, I

Enjoying my new slide scanner has led me to revisit some older slides that I haven't looked at mostly because they were over exposed or poorly composed. The slide scanner (along with Photoshop) has allowed me to revive some nice older photos.  This collection is from a day in summer 1979, spent at Mission Tower in Los Angeles, where the tracks to/from LAUPT cross the ATSF, SP and UP, as well as the Los Angeles River. An interesting place to shoot with many vantage points and tracks coming in from all directions of the compass. Not many rail fans ventured to this spot in East LA because of the crime and also the preponderance of "junk" power on transfer jobs.

We started directly at the Tower and caught some morning passenger traffic, such as this San Diegan backing out the north west leg of the wye, before lining up for the mainline and heading south to San Diego on the Santa Fe; the track crossing in the foreground is the SP Sunset route

 

Shortly after that, the station switcher, an ex Frisco GP-7 appeared hauling the consist of the Southwest Chief out of LAUPT down the south west leg of the wye, headed for the coach yards at Redondo Jct. (view looking S).

this was followed by the power from the SWC, which ran light down to Redondo Jct (view looking N). SDP40F's stilled ruled.

 

 

next an ATSF switcher in the form of a CF-7 rolled by and briefly paused at the tower to chat with the operator

 

Across the river, an SP transfer job went RR-west (compass North) with transfer from the UP yard to Taylor yard located about 1 mile north.  An interesting mix (even back then) of non turbo EMD SD7's, GP-9 and an SW1500

 

 

 

Final passenger move of the morning was the departure of the Coast Starlight from LAUPT

 

Next we moved across the river to a vantage point atop a huge dirt pile, two stories high. Perfect for railfanning.  Looking west across the river, the first train is another transfer heading north from the ATSF Hobart Yard toward Taylor Yard.  More SD-7's and GP-9's woohoo!!  The tower is partially in the view behind the truss bridge.  The gray girder bridge is the UP line into LAUPT which crosses the ATSF at grade right under the lead SD-7.  The track across the river on the truss bridge is the SP Sunset Route to Colton, and beyond. The track crossing it in the lower left is the SP between the UP yard and Taylor, and the curving track is the connector that allows traffic from LAUPT to access the SP going north.  Another leg connects the SP off to the left (SE quadrant) with the Sunset route for eastbound moves.

 

 

in fact here comes a UP to Colton transfer on that SE quadrant connection

 

moments later across the river a short ATSF local freight enroute back to Hobart Yard eases to a stop. Dodger stadium and Chinatown are on that wooded ridge inn the background.

 

 

while directly in front of us a freight from Taylor swings onto the NE quadrant of the connection to go east from Taylor toward Colton.

 

 

Another train, this time a road job headed for Portland Oregon was on the heels of the Colton job but heads due north with two U-33-c's.

 

 

 

one hour in Palmer

My survey work on the Chicopee River near Springfield ended early on the Friday of Columbus Day weekend, so on my way home I spent an hour having a late lunch trackside at Palmer, to take pot luck on rail traffic.  In one hour, I was able to catch movements on all running tracks!

 Shortly after I arrived a westbound ballast extra rolled up to the west end of the siding, and dimmed its headlight.  I suspected a meet was in progress; ten minutes later, an eastbound loaded auto rack track sailed by:

 

 

 

Once the autorack cleared up, the extra got a high green and went west with it’s freshly repainted GP-40

 

note the solar panel and electrical cabinet on the ballast car. Each car was so equipped. Not sure what purpose they have

a few minutes after CSX cleared the interlocking, a New England Central GP-38 scurried north across the diamond

The final act was the reverse move of the northbound Vermonter, which rolled in from Springfield being pushed by it’s Genesis engine, paused while the engineer changed positions from cab car to locomotive, and the conductor dismounted and lined the two manual crossovers.  All in all the reverse move, and manual turnout process consumed almost 15 minutes

 

after crossing to the connection to New England Central, the train then stopped again to let the rear brakeman (I assume) realign the turnouts before leaving town

 

And off they went (shortly after that, so did I)!

Black Friday and black diesels

Charles Kadyk who now lives in Mohnton, PA (near Reading) kindly hosted me for a bit of railfanning this past Friday. We chose the former Reading RR (now NS) west of the city of Reading, as NS was running their full schedule and I had never seen that part of the railroad.  It’s essentially the funnel between Harrisburg and New York, and connects the former PRR MIDDLE DIVISION mainline as well as RDG Hagerstown gateway to the south with Allentown and NY/NJ, and Philadelphia. Multiple track and rolling country, so trains are frequent and fast. I think the longest we waited between trains may have been 30 minutes.  Plenty of signals and crew chatter so its easy to know when trains are nearby.  East of the Reading area, suburban sprawl has drained the area of much of its character and clutters most views, but from Reading west the feel of the region is still very much present, there's still some RDG atmosphere, and the landscape around the railroad less cluttered.

We started out at Wyomissing Jct, which is where the lines from Philadelphia and from Allentown both converge on the west side of town.  There's signals, as well as a stiff westbound grade coming out of the Schuylkill valley there.  After a brief wait we nailed a hard working westbound work extra behind an unorthodox combination of SD 40-2 and MP-15, and including some “vintage” well used N&W and Southern rolling stock:

We moved a few miles west to Sinking Spring, a town with many grade crossings (so a nice place to listen to horn music), branch junction, and an ethanol plant.  No sooner than we arrived than an eastbound Enola>Allentown transfer job slammed by, with some garden variety road power

The most colorful lash up of the day was this empty oil can heading west with an SD-70 leading some BNSF power including a warbonnet

another eastbound, a double stack from NC headed for NJ

there were also some interesting line side structures such as this very modelgenic, smallish grain dealer (and active rail customer):

and the freshly restored Wernersville depot and freight station (the platform sheds still need some TLC)

That 150 MPH Sensation

Autumn leaves are flying as a southbound Acela Express approaches Kingston, RI at about 150mph.  Fastest in US.   10-20-13

SB Acela blows past Kingston.

I started to feel the "need for speed" after the school year began and had spent one too many an afternoon around District 1 watching slow freights plod along at 10 to 20 mph.  From previous trips and common knowledge I knew that the Acela Express hit 150 mph through the station at Kingston, RI and began eying the place on the web.  The excuse to go came when a friend agreed to go along.  We happened to pick an awesome day for sun, color and traffic too.  As it turned out we got a side order of "Swedish Meatballs" in the deal.

A "Swedish Meatball" AEM-7 leads a 'Regional'.

As easy as it is to translate a schedule, it gets complicated, apparently, when one tries to write down a lineup for Kingston on a Sunday.  Between filtering out the non-Sunday trains and putting down chronological times and numbers to distinguish Acela Express from Regional trains, I messed up a couple of North-South designations.  I even nearly missed one last Acela as I exited the depot just as it arrived. At least we were on the platform when 5 Acelas and some Regionals went by.
Mission accomplished. 

The last NB Acela we set up for overtook a late Regional in sight of the station.  That put them on the left-hand track and a bit slower than normal. We happened to be on the pedestrian bridge at the time so we had a good vantage point.   The low sun really made for some striking lines on all the hardware reflecting those rays.  The windows were actually pretty clean but the harsh glare was tough to work around.

The Acela trains did not disappoint.  No GE HHP-8 units but it was good to see the 30+ year old ASEA et. al AEM-7 "Swedish Meatballs" again.  They'll be replaced in the next few years as the new Siemens "Cities Sprinter" units are built and put into service.  I guess I'm attached to AEM-7's since I happened to do a semester in Sweden where their original ASEA "RC" form roamed in 1982.  I also caught the early Amtrak models in New Haven in 1981.  That makes these one of the few locomotive types I've seen and photographed throughout most of their lifespan.  I'll have to find those slides now.  They'll show up below one day. 

BC

ASEA unit on Swedish Railways (SJ).  Gavle, Sweden about Sept. 1982.

A typical AEM-7 "Swedish Meatball" leading a 'Regional' through Kingston.  10-20-13