Trackside with Trains Vol. 257: "Showers or Flowers" is LIVE

Trains Magazine General Discussion
1

Good morning,

This week’s Trackside with Trains photo contest is live for viewing and voting. The theme is “Showers or flowers” and eight different photographers are in the running. Vote for your favorite shot here:

http://trn.trains.com/photos-videos/trackside/2015/04/showers-or-flowers

Good luck!

Drew H.

2

I enjoyed the pictures of Chip Allen and Jordon Hoods pictures. The train in both pictures is the same train. The pictures were taken 8.4 miles from each other. I looked at both pictures several times to make sure I was correct. I used Bing Maps to determine the distance between the pictures. Daniel Braun

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Hi Daniel, I’m glad you enjoyed both our pictures! Chip and I are good friends and often railfan together so it’s no surprise we submitted the same train. In regards to our proximity, as the crow flies we were actually less than a mile apart. I was not in the city of Alto but more or less on the Lula-Alto line. Thanks again for liking the pictures!

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JHood (4-21):

I was born on the east coast, but have lived in Southern California since I was two years old, so I don’t have a whole lot of eastern railroad experience. Now a professor at the University of Geezerology (if you know what I’m alluding to), I did have a signal question about your friend’s (Chip Allen) photo. Norfolk Southern in the past has had rather exotic signals and signal arrangements. But Chip’s photo has an arrangement like one would see on Union Pacific and its territory of the western states, such as ‘single red’s over’ type displays. Is NS now using the UP approach on their signals? Metrolink (the Los Angeles area commuter trains) and BNSF use three light heads for everything, even if some positions are not used, whereas UP uses one, two, three, four position heads. Any input of this matter, Jordon, or anyone?

Best,

K.P.

PS: By the way, Jordan, you and Chip both have great contest photos!

5

Hey people, how about that result!!!

How often is it that there is a tie for 1st?! (@21.53%: MH, JH)

But to then have 3!!! tie for next placing …!!! [:O] (@13.16%: CA, JB, KS)

Drew, is there a possibility of getting the total number of votes for the poll(s) posted with the results? Really curious to see how many votes were in this one. [;)]

For the math minded, what is the probability of this occurring in 257 volumes? And no, 1-in-257 does not cut it. [:)]

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I know, Stephen, those results were wild!

I’ll talk with our online team and see if this is possible.

Drew