FL9

On Saturday, December 29th I got up extra early and put on my long underwear so I could stand out on the catwalk around the top of the Crest Tower at Davidson Yard in the 21 degree cold for this creative sunrise shot over the shoulder of the yardmaster on duty.

After the sun got a little higher, on the way out of the yard I caught this view of the Herzog HZGX 186 dedicated power for one of their unit maintenance of way trains.  I am not sure if this is really a GP38-2 in disguise or what without more research.

After picking my wife up to go back to Fort Worth for breakfast, we caught this westbound intermodal train just west of the west switch at Iona.  With the sun behind the train I went for this broadside view of the UP 8466 West.

On New Year’s Eve on the way home from work I stopped near the house for this pastoral scene a few minutes after sunset.

After Judy got home we headed back to Fort Worth for dinner and I took the back road through Iona.  We ran into a thick fog on top of the hill and found an eastbound merchandise train waiting on the main with a red signal at the east end of the siding.  I cranked up the ISO to 12800 and a few minutes later the train got a green signal into Davidson Yard.  I captured this view of the crossing gates coming down in the fog as my last photo of 2012.

I knew the UP would operate a reduced schedule for New Years Day 2013, so mid-morning when I heard an AMNLB autorack train get a green signal at the west end of Davidson yard I quickly drove to the overlook into the cut at the west end of the siding at Iona.  The temperature was 40 degrees but the wind made it much more unpleasant, so I stayed in the Explorer until I heard a horn at the east end of Iona.  I was fortunate that the sun came out just before the UP 7363 running solo filled the viewfinder.

There were two new KCS auto cars in the train and they both had the anniversary logos on them.

The UP 8609 working as the DPU on this 1 x 1 train was just transitioning from power to dynamic braking as it slid past me on the way downhill to Aledo while the clouds once again blocked out the sun.

I am glad I got out for this train as only heard one eastbound on the radio later on before it got dark on the first day of 2013.

On December 24th as the FWWR prepared for a day off on Christmas Day,  It was decided the Dublin Turn would only run as far as Tolar and leave their Dublin cars there for one of the Dublin jobs to come pick up on December 26th.  The train got out of the yard a little after 11:30am with a matching lashup of all four SD40′s lugging around 80 cars.  I had Christmas chores to finish, but since it is only a few minutes from home, with advance warning I caught the train climbing the grade out of the Mustang Creek bottom towards Cresson.  The weather was mild and sunny and the four turbocharged units in Run 8 sounded great as they passed me near milepost 16 making around 20 mph.

I drove on ahead a mile to catch them one more time at the grade crossing on the way to Cresson.  The fir trees and fence of the house out of sight to the left added a little color to the dry Texas winter scene.

The last twenty cars of the train were filled with natural gas pipe headed for the loadout at Decordova between Granbury and Tolar.

The crew called me on the radio and requested a set of prints of these shots for the engineer and conductor, and I told them I would be happy to oblige and put a selection in each of their stockings hung over the fireplace at Hodge Yard.

Back in 2007 when my father was still alive out in Sweetwater I took him out for a drive on a Saturday afternoon.  Stopping by the BNSF yard office I found out I had missed the CSX #1 leading an eastbound freight on its way to Temple by 15 minutes.  The roads being what they are I would have had to probably go most of the way to Brownwood to get ahead of it, and I could not do that with my father in the car.  I made it a goal to track it down sometime in the future whenever I was back east, but never got close in the following years.

Last week out of the blue I got a call from one of my friends that the CSX #1 was leading an eastbound train into the metroplex on the UP, so I finally put my plan into action.  With a little help from friends at the UP it was spotted in a fairly good location so I could get a roster shot.

It had a light tower and a few poles in the background, but hey, sometimes you take what you can get, and I have no complaints as I finally accomplished my goal.  The fact that my son lives in West Virginia makes it even better!

I have been busy finishing up the 2012 update to the “Dallas Then and Now” book I authored back in 2001, and that project is almost done now.  The publishers tell me the book will be on the shelves this spring.  I managed to finish up the Thanksgiving weekend with special treat, so finally here is a new post!

My original plan was to drive over to Wylie Sunday afternoon to catch the KCS 2012 Christmas Train facing west in perfect light.  But then around 10:30 I got an email from crew member and friend Shawn Levy that they were going to turn the train around before the 4:00pm opening to the public.  This meant the engines would be parked in Wylie in terrible light coming right out of the sun.  So Judy and I raced to get out of the house and we made the 50 mile drive from home south of Fort Worth to Garland in record time thanks to the George Bush Turnpike.  They would be using the KCS’s ”iron triangle” in Dallas, Garland, Richardson and Plano where each leg of the wye is approximately five miles long.  The question was which way would they go out of Wylie to begin with?

I was not quite in radio range yet when the train was ready to leave Wylie Yard, but thanks to David Hawkins I learned the train would head south down the Dallas Sub first to Dallas Junction (ex-ATSF Zacha Junction) and then make a reverse move up the White Rock Industrial Lead.  Judy and I made it to the South Shiloh Road crossing just north of I635 in Garland about ten minutes ahead of the train.  I set up for this relatively pole-less photo as the train rolled by at about 20 mph.

By the time I got back in the Explorer and made it down to the junction, the conductor had thrown the switch and KCS1 was starting its backup move onto the White Rock Industrial Lead. I pulled over and shot the train backing up over East Northwest Highway with the Santa Fe emblems still showing on the bridge girders.

I did not see any good locations or lighting as the train backed up westbound along the north side of I635, so we jumped ahead to the only underpass on this route where the tracks go under Skillman and then Forest Lane.  The lighting was perfect in this view taken from the Forest Lane overpass with the train moving in reverse away from the camera.

We drove back to I635 and then headed north on Highway 75.  I thought I could beat the train to Campbell Road for my next shot, but they made excellent time and the Christmas caboose was just starting over US75 from right to left when I exited at Campbell Road.  Luckily traffic behind me was light and my windshield was clean so I took this slow-rolling view as the F’s backed over the busy highway.

I knew at this point I could not beat the train to any good photo locations near White Rock Junction where the train would start forward again eastbound towards Alliance Junction in Wylie.  We got back on US75 and headed north into Plano so while the train was navigating through the junction I could use the time to follow the Alliance Subdivision east through town.  The light would be off the nose now but  I wanted to find one more spot with decent scenery to catch the beautiful F-units before they turned north and directly out of the sun in Wylie.  I found what I was looking for a few hundred feet west of the Jupiter Road crossing in the back of an industrial park near the east end of the Plano siding.  With careful cropping I was able to get the first photo below of the whole train a few minutes later with no real signs that it was taken close to downtown Plano in the midst of urban sprawl.

One more shot of the power a few seconds later and then I photographed each car in the train since I had good side lighting.

Behind the nine business cars came the six special Christmas exhibit cars.

At this point we decided to let the train go as listening to the radio conversations the crowd to tour the train was already gathering in Wylie so we would have had a long wait to see the interior.  Instead we stopped for a late lunch at Russo’s Coal-Fired Italian Grill (shameless plug, but the food is terrific!) at Campbell Road and US75 before heading back to Fort Worth with our mission accomplished!