I’ve visited the Powder River Basin area of Wyoming a couple times. If one wants to watch coal trains run like streetcars, that’s the place to go. Here’s an image from a couple years ago as I caught a UP empty train heading towards one of the mines. This particular section of track is triple-track; some areas have four mainlines. The scenery of the area is that of a grassland and this image captures that look.

Lon and I have been discussing in the past few weeks how there are very few Cascade green painted units in Vancouver.  Sunday I didn’t see any.  Does that mean the BN is gone?   It seems it is at least from a paint job perspective.   Heck, even a lowly workaday engine like the 2258 pictured above is now in the proper corporate scheme.

I’ll miss Cascade green.  As I was growing up it was a fresh new color on a hopeful new railroad and I came to love it.  Something about the green and black meant serious railroading, prosperity, and a bright future.   I was hooked.  When I lived in Michigan I sought out the Powder River Basin coal trains that passed through town because that was the only way I could get my fix of the green in a land of blue.  I needed it because blue was different and just didn’t represent railroading the way I knew it.

I’m sure a few more Cascade green units will pass through Vancouver before the last one is repainted.  I’ll keep an eye out for them but I don’t expect much.  Does that mean the BN gone?  For now I’ll just say another chapter in BN’s history book is nearly finished and leave it at that.

Yesterday Vancouver had a surprise foreign visitor, KCS 4100 which I believe is the class unit of their SD70ACe series in the newer Heritage paint scheme. It was the trailing unit on a westbound train at 8th street (in some amazingly craptastical lighting… but you take what you can get, right?).

Technorati Tags: trains, railroad, vancouver, vancouverwashington, kcs, sd70ace

Recently I went about town for some photo taking opportunities and managed to grab a few decent shots of a Portland & Western freight rolling on through Union Station downtown. It’s been gorgeous the last few days and I just figured that at least a few trains ought to be photographed.

For some reason there is a strong association between Christmas and trains.  Stores include trains in their holiday displays.  Many folks have a loop of track around their tree.  And, if you’re the Oregon Zoo, Christmas provides a great time to light up Washington Park and Zoo Railway’s #1 steam locomotive as part of ZooLights:

Merry Christmas to all!

Technorati Tags: trains, railroad, christmas, oregonzoo, zoolights