nowadays, locomotives from every railroad make it onto every other railroad. power pools, horsepower payback and so on… in the days of steam did railroads have similar arrangements? or did that start with diesels?
Much less pooling than now. For example, the Pennsy and the Wabash ran an extremely fast Detroit - Chicago train, for a while the very fastest in the USA acording to the Stefee Railroad Mag. speed survey, via Fort Wayne, with the fastest timing between For Wayne and Valpariso on the PRR. Both railroads used Atlantics, the PRR the E-6, of course. But they were swapped at Fort Wayne.
The Canadian Pacific Pacifics (4-6-2) ran regularly into North Station, Boston, on the Red Wing and Alouette from Montreal, and the Boston and Main and Maine Central sometimes pooled power on Boston - Bangor trains, although sometimes power was swapped at Portland, ME.
The Pennsyania-Reading Seashore Lines owned no locomotives but used rented PRR and Reading steam, and after Broad Street was torn down and before dieselization was complete this lead to the uncongruous sight of a wide Wooten-firebox Reading Pacific occasionally at 30th Street Station!
But in general pooling power was much less frequent int he steam days.
I remember a picture of a UP 4-10-2 helping a Santa-Fe freight on Cajon. I don’t know if pooled use of helpers on the joint trackage was common or if this was an exception.
UP & NP power was pooled on the old Camas Prarie lines in Idaho, primarily 2-8-2’s and 2-8-0’s due to weight restrictions. It was a very interesting line during the last days of steam and the movie “Breakheart Pass” was filmed there.
That’s a little different than the run-through pools today. I think the extended range of diesels make that more feasible than during the steam era.
The RDG and WM pooled power on the crossline operations between Rutherford and Cumberland.
Dave H.
Mark when I was in Devore (I think) 2 years ago they were tying on UPRR helpers to a BNSF train so maybe the pooling arrangement is still in effect in the C. Pass? [:p][:o)]
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Originally posted by Mark_W._Hemphill
Extensive pooling requires standardized engines. In steam-days, this was not the case.
It was not until the New Haven was merged into Penn Central that GG-1’s started regularly handling passenger trains up to New Haven, eliminating the engine change at Penn Station, New York. Despite the New Haven EP-2’s having been tested on the PRR and having been the basis for the GG-1 design.
After the GG-1’s started running through to New Haven, and before Conrail took over, the Electric Railroaders’ Association charged an MP-54 Pennsy multiple-unit train to cover the trackage from Penn Station to New Haven and New Canaan. As far as I know that was the only time Pennsy MU equipment other than Metroliners ran across the Hell Gate Bridge and on New Haven tracks.
B&M and Central Vermont pooled passenger power between White River Jct and Springfield. I believe this was to equalize mileage as part of the run was on CV rails and part on BM rails. Also there was some sort of crew pooling as well. Also CP and BM freight between White River Jct and Newport Vt. pooledd freight power.
The RDG and CNJ also pooled steam passenger power between Jersey City and Harrisburg. They also pooled steam freight power between Elizabethport and Falls yard in Philadelphia. B&O ran their power through on the RDG and CNJ from Philadelphia to Jersey City. CNJ ran through their power on the Reading’s Atlantic City Railroad from Winslow Junction to Atlantic City.
I do not know if you would call it a pooling arrangement but the PRR and RDG would take turns providing power and crews for the transfer runs between Enola and Rutherford. Each would run it for a set number of months, then the other.
Transfer arranagements as mentioned above are informal agreements to attempt to balance the work between each road’s seniority rosters and are not really pooling. It is usually an attempt to get control labor costs compared to the usual method of a crew delivering transfers from their road and returning light or caboose hop.