My home is 1 mile from my office. For the last 18 years, I’ve had the luxury of going home to eat leftovers for lunch. For the last two weeks( and possibly before that, as it just cooled down enough to open the windows 2 weeks ago) I’ve been able to hear the Ellis & Eastern Railroad come through every afternoon at the same time. The tracks cross my route to work about 4 blocks up the street. There is about a 1mile stretch of line that has a grade crossing every block. Every day, the train comes through at 12:50. I know as soon as I hear the train, that it’s time to head back to the salt mine. Anybody else live near a railroad that you can set a watch to?
the L&N used to pass the wsm radio station and the sound of the whistle came in over their brodcast. so every afternoon at a certain time they would blow the whistle.I dont think the radio sation does that anymore.
stay safe
Joe
I live only a block from the Ellis & Eastern’s mainline, and I can always tell from which direction they are coming. I can usually hear the rumble of the engines even before the engineer blows the airhorns for the 14th St. crossing. Oftentimes when I am on my way home from running errands in the downtown area and I can hear them in the far off distance, I will wait for them midway between 14th St. and the old Rock Island bridge which spans the Sioux River. It has almost become something of a ritual to me.
CANADIANPACIFIC2816
JoeK failed to mention that it was the sound of the L&N’s flagship southbound Pan American that was broadcast daily to area radio listeners.
Mark
BNSF’s main line into the northwest side of Houston.
Former Fort Worth and Denver, (joint Rock Island and CB&Q).
Inbound Casey Yard Transfer run to PTRA…
I get to listen to my work heading to …well, my work!
05:30 sharp every morning, seven days a week.
If I leave when they hit the crossing at 43rd street, I can beat them to North Yard by an hour at least.
Ed
Right now I live in a Residence Inn that overlooks directly a 25-train-a-day main line plus a major light-rail line. I asked for a room on the railroad side, and they sure looked at me funny.
Sounds great, because the Class I is working up a heavy grade with mostly loads.
The ones I’ve been close to enough to notice tend to run trains at about the same time for several months then change the schedule. A very busy NS usually runs trains through Waterloo, IN just about 20:15 or so. Right on time to stop playing roller hockey (game’s done) and head in to town.
No, I can’t do that. I live along the UP line…
I cry. Mercer County in Illinois has no trains. Only 1 caboose in Keithsburg on the old M&SL.
The Dayliner pulls in to the Station 6 blocks away at 10:40 and then goes by my place at 11:00 6 days a week (later on Sundays). Around 12:00 the SRVI train goes by (Mon-Fri) and the returns 1:00-1:30. The Dayliner goes by again at 3:20 and leaves the station at 3:40.
I can’t neither as I live along the busy 4 track mainline from Rotterdam Central to Dordrecht here in the Netherlands. However, in the evenings, 10 minutes before the hour (say between 20.00 pm and 2.00 am) a freighttrain comes along and starts braking while on it’s way to the harbor or Kijfhoek hump yard. I haven’t timed other trains recently.but there are plenty of passenger and a growing number of freighttrains…
When it is leaves on the ground time of the year I have a front row seat too. [:D]
greetings,
Marc Immeker
Way, way back, when I was in junior high school, I walked about a mile to school (uphill both ways, but that’s a different tale). During the 20 minutes of my walk, I could almost always expect three northbound C&O freights to come through town, essentially running on each other’s markers.
One might have been a southbound, though - I really don’t recall. There is a passing siding about three miles north of the village. Regardless - they were almost always there.
Most of the time, you’re lucky to be able to set your calendar by the operation of the RR near my home…[;)]
I live a few blocks away from the tracks that the SDIV and MTS trolley run on (now owned by the transit authority). The freight can’t run when the trolleys are running so the freight only runs at night (really fustrateing for picture takeing). So on nights that the SDIV runs from San Diego down to San Yisidro yard the train leaves after the last trolley gets off the line. You can’t quite set your watch by it but it passes by my house between 2:10-2:20am. The return trip passes by around 4:00am.
I can hear Amtrak perfectly from our closet duplex. I set my watch by it every day! I also show up at work at different times each day!
[(-D] I’d like to see the look on your boss’s face when you explain that you were late because Amtrak was.[:D]
Weird! I hope you don’t also have a bathroom duplex, that would be awkward.[:O]
My last visit to Steamboat Springs, Colo. included an overnight stay at the Rabbit Ears Motel located downtown. On one side of the complex is a set of rooms that face both the Yampa River and the U.P. (nee DRGW) Moffat extension to Craig. Those rooms were $10/night extra because of the river view.
When I told the motel clerk that I wasn’t at all interested in view the river view but I wanted a room that faced the tracks she said, “Hmmm, you must be a railfan. For railfans that’ll be $20 extra because you’re getting the tracks and the river as an added bonus!”
AS FOR LOOKING AT YOU FUNNY, I got the same reaction while checking in at Fitzgerald’s Club in downtown Reno three years ago. The place is located on Virginia St. right at the U.P. (nee Espee) mainline crossing. While very nice and accomdating, the lady behind the desk gave me a puzzled look and a “humor him” smile when I too asked for a room facing The Overland Route mainline. I was mildly surprised that she didn’t charge me extra for such a superior location within the hotel.
“Being a member of the railfan fraternity is a mental condition where to the initiated, no explanation is necessary; but, to the unintiated, no explanation is possible.”
I live a mile east of the CSX Niagara Sub(NYC Niagara Falls Branch/PC/Conrail Niagara Branch). ANY idea that I could rely on listening for a train to judge the time would be an exercise in futility![B)][sigh][banghead]
Here in Valparaiso the NS (Nickel Plate to some of us) operates on a pretty tight schedule for most of their trains.
I wont go into complete detail of the 25+daily trains, but I will say that when I hear a whistle I can guess fairly accurately which train it is.
Most dependable are the eastbound intermodals:
25A - 7am
262 - 8pm
215 -830pm
236 - 10pm
Also very dependable are the Chicago - Greensboro intermodals 217/218. These have been called Mail Trains for their inclusion of UPS trailers. Those pass around 6am (both eb and wb).
Then, of course the 323 turn to Van Loon comes calling about 1230pm and returns around 330pm, followed by the 280 autorack train and then the 324 Elkhart - Ft Wayne train.
NS is tight.
ed