I only have 5 or 6 cabooses. Most of my trains and rolling stock are modern. Since I am modeling the modern day eg sd 70, dash9, I don’t feel the need for cabooses. I like cabooses and think they are nostalgic. What are your thoughts on this subject? Are they just for layouts depicting the early years? Do they have a place on a modern layout?
I saw a BNSF caboose in motion in Temple, TX, prominently labeled “switching platform”.
CSX calls em shoving platfoms.
Cheers,
Carl T.
SDR, Not only were they a little rough riding but they were absolute [censored] at the end of a coal or an ore train.
Hello All: I have seen a C.N. caboose on a farm up here in the great white north on a farm. This guy sanded down all of the interior, refinished the wood & it became a playhouse for the kid’s. Steve
I have started a small collection of cabooses when I can get them reasonable,
am waiting for three from e-bay --[:)][:)]
There are a few exceptions but cabooses have no place in modern railroads. Most cabooses you will find today are on a dead track in town, serving as a monument to past excessive labor that the railroads were forced to hire.
As such, that would be a great place to model them.
My train world has cabooses, however, as I’m modeling a bygone era.
You can always have a small loop with a tourist railroad or build a Caboose motel. I know of two of these. The most well known is near Strasburg, PA with a dozen or so cabeese set around the property to spend the night. There is also one about 50 miles from me in Avoca, NY. Most of these are Pennsy N5’s.
There are quite a few either attached to restaurants or on private residences. Die Hard train nuts, no doubt.
Pete
I saw one in use a small bobber caboose north of Binghamton NY it was on a maintenance crew and looked like they used it to get out of the weather for breaks and lunch,etc. It was being pulled by a GP38.
laz57
What are they good for? What a question!
Well, seems to me that no freight is complete without a caboose - kind of like in the days gone by when men wore hats (of course they took them off indoors - exceptions would include those in uniform while working inside a train). So what good was the hat? Hmmm - perhaps just a badge or some symbol of railroading that completed the picture.
(Don’t get me started on today’s world with the baseball cap craze - that is without defining!)
What are they good for?
They are good for people like me who appreciate a finished picture!
My railroad is modern - 1990’s - and I use 'em still. My CP/CP Rail and CN freights look great with them. Since it is MY railroad in MY trainroom in MY basement, those of you who might gag at the thought or sight are not invited!
Great question!
A few years back prior to the UP/SP merger, I watched an SP freight go by and on the end was a white caboose (SP style) prominently labeled “Railroad Police.” Too bad it happened so fast that I could not get to the camera (I wasn’t expecting a caboose).
The freights that go along the US/Mexico border are plagued with cross border breakins and theft. I assume the RRs use RR Police and caboose regularly along those lines.
Regards,
Roy
Many excursion trains run with them. The Portola Museum runs a caboose train (the Pacific roads: Union, Central, Western, Missouri, Southern. . . ). I have footage of the Frisco 1522 running with two cabeese: one right after her own tool car and one on the end of the mixed frieght she was pulling.
Whether I have steam or a modern diesel on the point, I run cabooses. Although I am all for efficiency, I rather like the idea of five-man crews on trains 
and a train without a caboose is like a sentence without a period. It just ain’t finished 
I have a Maerklin catalog that shows some mostly European models with the names of American railroads painted on them. One train, to emphasize its American-ness, has two cabooses, lettered for different railroads!
I live in the Toledo, Ohio area…lots of real train action around here including a few big yards. Within the last year I’ve seen a caboose 3 times now. The first one I was so shocked I grabbed my video camera…glad I had it in the car…then I had to call a friend to tell him. He said he had seen few recently as well. Prior to that…I hadn’t seen one in probably 15 years. I don’t know if they are on the comeback or if there has been light usage all this time. Most of the trains through here are CSX, NS, and CN.
underworld
[:D][:D][:D][:D][:D]
Conrail’s blue caboose CR 22135 had been used in Lima, Ohio, for several years, but has recently disappeared from town. CSX had been using the caboose for switching tank car movements from its yard in North Lima (old B&O, north-south), its yard at Cole Street (old PRR, east-west) and the P&G (Tide soap) factory east of town (on old PRR). Now that CF&E is operating on the PRR main, the caboose was apparently no longer necessary, bringing sadness to my 7-year old son with whom I chased it about town[:(].
I see cabooses fairly often. Off Hwy 291 near Liberty, MO (suburban Kansas City), there’s an old Burlington Northern caboose sitting in plain view. Who knows when it last moved, but it’s there. There’s also a town in southern Illinois (Valmeyer, maybe?) where there’s a Mopac caboose in a park.
They may not be on the ends of trains very often, but that doesn’t mean they’ve disappeared entirely. If you’re modeling the modern era, there’s still room on the layout for a caboose or two.
We should start a club, any time you see a caboose tell a on the forum. Sounds COOL.?
laz57
Here in Tucson the Southern Pacific used to run cabooses on the local mine trains. The switches on these runs are not on automatic control. If it were not for a crew member in the caboose, the crew member who threw the switch for the mine branch would have to run up to the engine after setting the switch back to the secondary line.
Now that UP rules, cabooses are gone.
Wayne
Up here, The New England Central runs a caboose on the end of the Winooski Subdivision local every day. As it’s a local, I believe the brakeman rides the crummy to throw the switches back for the mainline after the train has cleared.
They’ve recently re-painted the caboose bright orange, with a NEC signe on the side.
Jon [8D]
The UP makes extensive use of Cabooses (cabeese?) on their MoW trains - including my favorite one painted grey and lettered for CGW! I think they are used for some distinct jobs too- where the cars are ‘pushed’ up a single line with no turning or run-around track – there’s one in my hometown yard. They are also used for transfer runs - there are always a few dull-yellow (and sometimes extensively graffitted) ex-C&NW bay-window cabooses in Chicago’s North Ave. yard.