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To Get Around Snow, BNSF Detours Across Western Canada
Canadian National Train F305 approaches Chappell Yard in Saskatoon, Sask., with a detoured BNSF grain train on February 17. This rare move across western Canada took place due to massive snow accumulations and avalaches that blocked the BNSF mainline through Marias Pass near the southern edge of Glacier National Park in Montana.
PHOTO BY ADAM REGUSH
Union Pacific Calls up Rotaries on Donner Pass
Heavy snowfall required Union Pacific to activate its former Southern Pacific rotary snowplows to keep the route over Donner Pass clear. Based in Roseville, Calif., the rotaries were converted from steam power in the 1950s and are now powered by EMD F7B units. SPMW No. 209 is powered down, shoving piled snow against its blade, as the plow crew crosses over at the Norden snowshed on February 24. The plows work in tandem with flanger crews who clear snow from between the rails to keep tracks passable for freight and passenger trains.
PHOTO BY JOHN GAFFNEY
Signal Update
CSX is quickly working toward its Positive Train Control commitments to get as many lines as possible upgrad- ed by the deadline. CSX is in many different stages of upgrades across the system. A few include the Detroit Sub where initial work has started, the Saginaw Sub where new signal cutovers are taking place between March and May south of Plymouth, Mich., and the well-known CSX Pemberville Sub where C&O signals will be cutover in 2018 but work will start in 2017. Color position light signals will fall in Ohio as well on the Cincinnati Terminal and the New Castle Sub this year. The Erie West Sub will also have work ramped up this year
with a completion by early 2018. This will be a busy year of old signal replace- ments, so get your shots of any search- lights or CPLs before it is too late.
Motive Power In February, CSX started parking
almost the whole fleet of ex-Conrail C40-8Ws. These 60 units are numbered CSX 7300–7359 and were built from 1990–1993, which makes these units 24–27 years old. There are a few that didn’t show any notes of storage in the system, but these were units that already had PTC equipment installed. The 7300s were quickly sidelined at places like Huntington, W.V., Cumber- land, Md., and Russell, Ky. CSX was
able to sideline these units due to the influx of new Tier 4 GEVOs that have come online in the last few months.
Coal Revival? Some CSX branchlines in West Virgin-
ia and Kentucky have seen a few coal trains come back from mines that were closed in the past due to the demise of coal traffic in the East. While traffic isn’t close to what it was, some believe this is a sign that eastern coal will make a slight comeback before it fades for good. As of mid-February, CSX had started to run coal shifters on old Chesapeake & Ohio lines that had not seen a train in over a year. Since the start of 2017, most Class I railroads have seen an increase
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