I’m looking for information on coal train consists c. 1945 to 1960. coming into Omaha-Council Bluffs on the Q, Milw, C&NW.
Would these have been in large blocks of cars or cars scattered through the train?
Did coal hoppers stay on the home road or would a typical train have hoppers from various roads?
Did big eastern road hoppers make it into Omaha-CoB.; PRR, B&O N&W, VGN, NYC??[
I’d like to take this oportunity and ask about any (if such existed) coal trains that operated on Sherman hill in the same time period as Mike asked about.
Trainload movements of WY coal did not start untill the early 1970s.
Before 1970 coal moved through Council Bluffs as single car shipments. The only railroad in the area with coal mines was the Q. Those shipments would have terminated on the Q as well as comming to Council Bluffs and being interchanged with the other railroads at that locacation. When loose car railroading was king you would see coal hoppers show up from about any railroad at a major interchange like Council Bluffs.
Bob is correct, prior to the advent of the bulk coal shipments (trainloads)in the 1970’s, most mines shipped in small blocks of a couple of cars or three or more to customers. The bigger power plants at that time were mostly on rivers or close to where coal could be unloaded directly from the barges(ie, Allen Steam Generating Plant at Memphis or Colbert in North Alabama to name a couple), trainloads were pretty much unheard of to single customers. Most of those would have been on the Appallcian[?] Coal fields and were going via roads like the Souithern or Norfolk Western,Virginian,etc to tidewater piers for transhipment to ocean shipping.
Throughout the 1960s, when coal was still used as a heating fuel, one would likely see hoppers from C&O, N&W, VGN, and L&N. I lived in Michgan, but it should be possible to say that those railroads originated the type of heating coal that would be used almost anywhere coal was used. Other railroads that originated coal in those days–B&O, PRR, NYC, RDG, SOU–didn’t show up locally. Of course, hoppers from railroads to the west of us were rare, with the possible exception of IC. (Our coal came in on the GTW, so that assortment didn’t really play favorites with any other railroad.)
When I first hired out on CNW, before unit trains were used by nearly everybody, we’d get some good-sized blocks of coal–20 or more cars–for destinations in Wisconsin. C&O and NYC hoppers were most common there (even though it was Penn Central, we didn’t get many ex-PRR cars). Single loads would also show up from time to time.
Interestingly, we still get some good-sized blocks of loaded CSXT hoppers for Abbott Labs in Waukegan, and some single loads for out west somewhere in–get this!–RBMN hoppers!
If I may switch this train to another track for a bit, I noticed that small iron foundries will get a hopper or two of coke at a time. There is one out here (and there used to be another) that would get coke in from Birmingham, AL in BN 529000 and 541000 series hoppers (if I remember correctly). I suspect that the one that is still in operation gets the coke in larger TCMX 63000 series (if I remember correctly) hoppers now.
So what was mostly transported in WY by UP in times ofr turbines and big boys?
What kind of cars/load?
Westbound-Fruits, vegtables, forest products moving from California, Oregon and Washington to the Northeastern US and Eastern Canada. The peak time would come in October.
Eastbound-Manufactured products from the Northeastern US to CA, OR and WA.
WY is WY. They shipped some livestock and, after 1950, soda ash. Bascially the UP went WY so fast they just blew the pigeons of the Rock Springs Depot.
so then, there were mostly boxcars?
I think I’ve also seen some tank cars being pulled by a big boy in a pentrex preview video. What could that have been and heading where?
The fruits and vegtables moved in refrigerator cares (Pacific Fruit Express). The forest products moved in box cars and flat cars. The manufactured products moved in box cars.
Today the UP trains in WY are coal, double stack, double stacks, more coal and more double stacks. There are a few General Merchandise trains and large blocks of tank cars, but mostly double stacks and coal. The real coal traffic runs up north and down the North Platte River to North Platte and then east and south. 50+ trains a day. The wind also still blows, as it is tonight, gusts to 75 mph earlier today. The old Cheyenne depot always has coal and double stacks undergoing crew change.
Youre forgetting the autoracks.
Over in the west side of Wy we get Double Stacks, Autoracks, Coal, Soda ash, and the odd mixed freight which is mostly Frac sand and cement being delivered.
About 3 months ago a 15 year old girl was hit by a train (looked like suicide), needless to say, there were many letters to the editor saying how it was UP’s fault, Yea right, I naturally wrote a response stating that she was trespassing, and it was HER fault. the letters ended there, Anyway, UP says they only do 25MPH through town, which is BullPoop! I have yet to see a train that does less than 35MPH. The pigeons have now learned that they will fly off the roof when the train comes by, so now they move to the buildings across the road. [:)]
Mark,
Those are great stats on the percentages and coal production.
I was thinking some eastern empties might have been loaded in Illinois and shipped west to CoB, what with NYC, PRR, and B&O coming into Chicago and the B&O into St Louis.
No kidding? I never knew that Iowa had coal mines!
Interesting history. A good story on pre 1960 coal movement on the N&W can be found in a Trains article by Ed King. They did move trainloads of coal both east and west of Williamson, WV which was then (and perhaps still now) where the mine locals brought the coal, but I doubt that there were any full trains consigned to any one customer.
When I worked on the illinois Central from 1969 to 1975, the IC did move trainload consignments of metalurgical coal from a mine in Southern Illinois to Inland Steel. Exact origin and destination escapes me now, but I know that Inland owned the cars and I think the mine. That may have been one of the first coal unit trains movements in the modern era and I suspect that it was something of a model for the development of unit train operations for steam coal.
As Mark indicated, at that time coal for steam power was not subject to any significant differentiation. Aside perhaps from BTU, coal was coal. As a commodity, mine mouth prices were fairly uniform, and the “closest” mine tended to get any given plants business.
By the time I went to work for Old Ben Coal company in 1984, our mines in Illinois and Indiana shipped almost everything in unit train consignments. A good deal of tonnage was still moving in railroad owned hoppers, but power companies were moving toward using their own cars because the aquisition cost of those cars was added to the power company’s rate base.
As the power industry started to respond to clean air regulations, sulphur and other trace mineral content became a significant part of the buying decision. Thus there was greater differentiation between coals which did produce greater mine mouth price differentials.
Incidently, there could be some rather significant differences in sulphur content between coal with just a few miles separating the mines. We had two mines operating toward the southern end of Rend Lake near Benton, Illinois that were “high sulphur”. At the same time an Old
UP says they only do 25MPH through town, which is BullPoop! I have yet to see a train that does less than 35MPH.
Maybe your local Barney Fife can stop them and give them speeding tickets. Twenty-five or more years ago Crestline, Ohio had a Barney Fife that would run the trains down, get them stopprd and try to write the engineer a speeding ticket. I spent quite a few long nights sitting on U.S. 30 waiting for the fiasco to end so I could continue trucking towards Massilon, Canton and points east.
I have a related question regarding coal train consist. After the GN, CB&Q, NP merger, would they use cars from the various merged railroads for coal consists? Would it be typical to see CB&Q and GN cars together in the same train?
Yes to both questions. With the merger the former assetts (coal cars) belong to the new firm.
Anyone remember what a “black snake” is ? ?