FL9

Union Pacific’s Fort Worth Service Unit held their annual family day in the employee parking lot south of the diesel shops at Davidson Yard on October 20th this year.  At UP’s invitation to photograph the event for them, I arrived at 11:30am after spending the morning on the Baird Sub with mixed results.  Over the next four blog entries, here are 24 of my favorites taken during my five-hour stay.  The banner at the front entrance was taking quite a beating from the gusty winds.

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Saturday October 20th was Railroad Illustrated’s “Day in North America” for 2007.  I had originally planned to drive out to Sweetwater for the day, but late in the week the UP called and asked if I would photograph their Davidson Yard “Family Day” also on Saturday.  I immediately agreed and decided to spend the morning around North Annetta on the Baird Sub before heading back to the yard for Family Day.  Sleeping in on Saturday was very inviting, but I managed to get out of the house an hour before sunrise and work my way out to North Annetta.  A westbound intermodal left Fort Worth a little after 7:00am, and I hoped for a sunrise picture.  I picked a good spot where the sun would rise over the train, but alas he was moving too fast and the UP 7740 West with four new GEVO’s passed me at 7:31am about five minutes too soon for the picture I wanted.

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After we left Malvern behind, I negotiated two final railfan stops in Arkansas for the day before we set our sights on getting home to Benbrook at a resonable time.  We got off I30 at the Gurdon exit and made our way into town.  The ex-MP depot was still in use by the UP for maintenance forces.

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After switching from I40 to I30 in Little Rock, we made a pit stop at McDonald’s in Malvern, AR to refresh ourselves.  When we came out I could hear a nice K5LA horn close by, so we headed down to the UP mainline a few blocks away.  I was pleasantly surprised to see two GP35’s belonging to the Arkansas Midland Railroad delivering a cut of cars and several UP units on an interchange track next to the mainline.

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