Railroadfan.com

The bollards are nicer than the Jersey barriers. The gate doesn't look too restricting but it does make it clear that people are not supposed to drive down the tracks. Nothing will stop a motivated person.

It is interesting where they have been parking them. NS has been breaking the strings up to fill the space between the derail east of CP 421 to the yard, cutting for crossings.

CN does like to have a higher axle count to ensure their systems detect trains. One reason for the light engine speed limits is braking. Heavy engines that need a little help from the other cars in the train. On the South Shore in Indiana they have the following equipment restrictions: Passenger Tra...

Not far.

Doktor No wrote: ↑

Fri Dec 25, 2020 11:54 am

... for stupid terminations that happened because a TM had a vendetta or had to make bones with the upper management.

Protecting employees fired for "stupid" reasons is good. Protecting employees fired for good cause? Not so good. No railroad needs unsafe employees.

Which got me to thinking, how do they get CSX bulletins to get to the bridge in the first place? CSX has a presence in Grand Rapids. If Amtrak's fax machine can't receive any CSX bulletins they can go pick them up (or have them delivered to the station, if CSX is willing). It is nice of CSX to pass...

Steve B wrote: ↑

Mon Oct 19, 2020 12:45 pm

It's intriguing that none of the people who are cool with this policy ...

Who are you accusing of being cool with the policy (or, in this case, a definition of suspicious activity)?

If one is interested in the actual rules they can be found on the TSA website ... https://www.tsa.gov/for-industry/surface-security-training-rule It is a training program. The impact to railfans will be that some railroad employees will be trained and understand what the TSA considers a threat. Many...

Just remember that the first amendment applies to the government. It does not apply to private property. Auditors need to stick to public property and be careful not to violate any laws. All of our constitutional rights have limits.

chapmaja wrote: ↑

Sat Oct 17, 2020 11:12 pm

I don't know. I think after the lawsuit that would be filed against the government for violating your rights, you might do ok.

If anything the lawyer might do ok.

I have never been arrested, so I can't speak from experience. But getting arrested is certainly not on my bucket list.

How much planning work is needed by a CSX dispatcher serving Michigan in 2020? I see old school dispatchers as the kind who could thread a high priority train past slower trains without congesting their entire territory or their neighboring dispatcher's territories (whether that neighbor worked for ...

Often people like this run home and take a stiff drink. Can anyone prove BAC at the time of the incident if the person is not arrested on the spot?

I am surprised that they know that a train is involved in their shipments. One challenge of logistics is being able to handle the product at both ends. Boxcars work nice if the warehouses at both ends can handle rail (including yard work of re-spotting cars if more cars are on property than loading ...

David Lang wrote: ↑

Thu Sep 10, 2020 11:59 am

I wonder what would happen to people if the cell phone grid just stopped working.

Been there, done that. I predate cell phones.

Not sure I want to see what the youth that have never lived without a phone would do if the machine stopped.

Since the first time I saw that bridge about a decade ago, I've dreamed about getting an over-under shot with a southbound on the Marion Sub, and a westbound on the Wabash. Got to imagine my odds are nearly the same as hitting the Powerball. The odds of getting an under are fairly slim, let alone a...

Wandering around yesterday I found a new Amtrak platform under construction.
A section of the old platform remains but Amtrak is not currently stopping here (pandemic suspensions).

I have seen a few trains come out of the yard, stop and back up. I assume that they are either doubling the train or need extra headroom to push it over the hump.

*The idea there is to finish that long-stalled CREATE Project at Grand Crossing. So the PM would go from the PM to AML at New Buffalo, AML to CSS at Michigan City, CSS to the IC/Metra Electric at Pullman, then IC to the Waterlevel Route at Grand Crossing. At that point the NS is past most of the ma...

By the way, they did research doing their own ROW to Chicago. It’s in the plan from 2019. I’m not sure where it stands at this point but Amtrak is still exploring all options to fix the timing issues that NS doesn’t seem all that motivated to fix. Plan or wish list? When someone says plan I expect ...

The Midwest Regional Rail Initiative is a bad plan and most of it will never be built. They have St Joseph Michigan and South Bend Indiana served by bus routes on that map! It was a pipe dream written before recreational was legal in Michigan so I assume they had some bad drugs. I like the connectio...