FL9

John Briggs alerted me the UP had run their brush cutter down the Midlothian Sub from Ney Yard, and that the view looking north downgrade from Campus Drive in south Fort Worth was now open to the point you could see the full “S” curve.  The next day on Saturday April 26th Danny Sisson and I took advantage of this in the morning hours.  We just missed a BNSF freight here by less than a minute, but luckily a UP local was right behind it.

Two Gensets and two cars were just the right length to capture a train here in a still photo and be able to see the whole “S” curve too.  This would be a great spot for a video of a loaded coal train coming up grade.

The BNSF 4009 East we had caught earlier got a track warrant to meet a westbound train at Herman, so we situated ourselves in the middle of the “S” curves between Herman and Fairview to catch the westbound first.  In the end we had to wait a good while for the BNSF 5318 West to show up as that train made a pickup of new tank cars from the Trinity Plant before leaving Saginaw.

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After lunch in Bowie things were still backed up on the BNSF Wichita Falls Sub and nothing was close on the UP Duncan Sub, so we decided to photograph the logos on the two railroad bridges over Business 287 on the north side of town.  First we stopped at the old Fort Worth & Denver / Burlington Route overpass.

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We found a good spot along Highway 287 between Bowie and Bellevue where we could see the Wichita Falls Sub following the contour of the hogbacks.  Before long the BNSF 8816 East came into view, following the hills like a roller coaster.

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