At our local club meeting a few weeks ago, one member brought along a new Kato diesel as part of our “Show and Tell” session at the end of the meeting. It was painted in the nice BNSF “pumpkin” paint job - really neat looking. I commented that many years ago modelers running such engines from so far away could be ridiculed as it being “not prototypical”, but not these days, as it is almost possible to see any engine anywhere.
We’re in Canada’s Maritime Province of New Brunswick, almost as far away from BNSF territory that you can get in North America.
Wouldn’t you know it - a BNSF Dash 9 in the same scheme showed up here in Saint John yesterday and today! Who woulda thunk? It was sandwiched between two CN engines, and I assume it may have arrived with a potash unit triain from Saskatchewan. Anyway, I was thankfully able to take a few photos and have posted them in a web album in case anyone would like to have a look at the “Stranger in town”:
I see CN and CP engines all the time on the Union Pacific Sunset Route through southern Arizona. Many railroads are using “Pool Power” engines or have lease agreements or run-through agreements with other roads and freely exchange engines. Just yesterday, I saw a new BNSF, an older BN green, and a locomotive from a railroad that I had never heard of, intermixed with UP and Southern Pacific and Cotton Belt engines going through Benson, Arizona.
I have to agree. I am seeing power all over. I was down at the BNSF yard with little one and there was a KCS (SD90 I think, big sucker) sitting in the engine repair area. NS is really common to see around here. Up on the Trans Con line that BNSF (northern AZ) operates, I saw a few CSX’s. I guess it means stuff gets aroudn which is fine with me. I like varity and means I can but just about any road name and “getaway with it” on my lay out. Which is based loosely on Arizona.
Driving through Muncie Indiana on Friday I saw a UP locomotive parked on a siding in an abandoned factory. I am not sure how far east they normaly run but I do not recall ever seeing one on the track that runs through Oxford Ohio.
I live near the CSX (formerly the B&O “Old Main Line”), and of the last 5 trains I’ve seen at the crossing, 4 of them had at least 1 BNSF unit in the consist. One train was headed by a pair of wide-cab EMD SD’s (-80 or -90, not sure which) in the BN WhiteFace scheme.
Nowadays it seems like locos are as interchangeable among different roads as freight cars have always been.
A few years ago I saw a Union Pacific engine just outside of London Ontario. The first and only one I have ever seen. Last summer I saw a Ontario Northland Loco going through the town I live in. I’m modeling the Ontario Northland so it really surprised me. Lately I’ve seen a lot of SOO equipment that I normally wouldn’t see.