Who drives the Army locomotives? Does Army personnel or civilians?
It depends on the base. In most cases it is civilian employees of the Defense Logistics Agency. But there are two Railway Operating Battalions in the Army Reserve, and a few smaller units. One of the ROB’s is based in New England, and the other in Milwaukee area. The US Army Transportation Corps is Headquartered at Fort Eustis, VA. At Fort McCoy in Wisconsin there are three DLA employees who handle the day to day chores. The Milwaukee based ROB field trains at Fort McCoy and does heavy maintenance there. The Maintenance Co. of the ROBs will do heavy maintenance at various bases in support of the local DLA employees. Some detachments of Railway personnel have been to Iraq to help get Iraqi Railways back in operation. The Defense Dept. has their main railroad shops at Hill Air Force Base in Utah.
Thanks for the information. What about the other armed forces?
I will enlist just to ride trains. Now that’s job! You can’t beat that…
Are you sure there is a reserve ROB in Milwaukee?
The last I knew, there was only one reserve ROB in New England. The Milwaukee units are independant company size units that are to maintain rail equipment - they have no railway operating capabilities.
BTW, a long time ago I was stationed at Ft. Eustis. We were the last active duty railway soldiers in the US Army. Latter I served in the reserves with the 1156th Transportation Company (IIRC) which maintained locomotives. We were located in rented space in the Milwaukee Road shops in Milwaukee.
If they’ve added another operating batallion it would be news to me. But then, they could have.
Greyhounds, I am pretty sure about the Battalion being there, however the companies that make up the Battalion were scattered all over the Midwest. If I remember correctly one of the Companies was stationed in the Quad Cities, and another somewhere in Chicagoland. I think only the HQ and one company were actually in the Milwaukee Area, West Allis, IIRC.
As near as I can tell, the US Army at Fort Benning has the Norfolk Southern make up their transport trains for units going to the National Training Center.
Under the Base Realignment program, the Armor School is supposed to move from Fort Knox, KY, to Fort Benning, and I haven’t heard of any planning to change or improve the rail infrastructure of the post. They have a branch of NS that goes into post and terminates with ramps to drive their armored vehicles up onto flat cars.
I believe that Redstone Arsenal in Huntsville, Alabama, has a much more extensive series of sidings to move materiel by rail, but as far as I know, it’s civilian run.
I was aware of a Reserve Railroad Operating Battalion in Connecticut- the last time I was up there, about five years ago, the folks at the steam line up along the Connecticut river said that the units did their drills by working on maintaining the line. I wonder if they got mobilized for Iraqi Freedom? Seems like Mark Hemphill had his hands full with rebuilding the Iraqi rail system when he was there a couple of years ago.
A lot of the switcher diesels I have seen in some of the museums here in the South have US Army pedigrees. But I believe the Army got out of the railroad business a long time ago… and have civilians doing what switching there is to be done on posts.
I do remember a special train coming through Fort Monmouth (now closed) at Eatontown, NJ, en route for Earle Naval Weapons Depot about five miles away on the New Jersey coast. I don’t remember whose locomotive was on the lead end, except that it was not a DOD locomotive. This particular train was rumored to be carrying WMD’s aboard and had several protesters doing silly things like blocking the tracks with their bodies. The Military Police were called in and removed them off post. Ammo shipments into Earle were done by civilians, and if Earle still exists, a lot of that stuff is probably transported by truck.
I believe that the missile in question was the Peacemaker (at the time referred to as the “MX missile”). I think there was also interest in “railbasing” the follow on “Midgetman” (specifically designed to be deployed from mobile launchers, both rail and truck/crawler).
There is a prototype MX launcher train at one of the military museams.
The Navy has a nice railroad at Crane IN. It is not operated enlisted men. They also have a number of old switchers that they run and more that are or seem to be in storage. All are painted yellow with red lettering. No cameras are allowed on base so I have no pictures.
Try Googling “rail garrison concept”. There is a bit of info out there.
When I was still in I looked into it as a ( MOS ) Military occupational specility and was told it was strickly for reservist and I was also told they just did some limited maintenance and the Civillian drove the trains. here the Civillians move all equipment from post with Army Locomoitves to the CSX Main line if I am not mistaken
Do you know how many engines and types they were? [%-)]
http://www.usarc.army.mil/1205thtrans
http://www.usarc.army.mil/1205thtrans/history.htm
http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/agency/army/1205trans.htm
IIRC, The train were to be handled by standard road power consists out of the regular fleet. . There weren’t military locomotives assigned to it. I seem to remmber seeing an article in one of the railfan mags about the FRA Pueblo test facility showning some of the prototype equipment being stored there.
Interested information about the Army operations. I hope you enjoy!
Does anyone know of any dept. of the goverment that’s has their own engine? We know the Army but…
How about USN AND USMC locomotives.
I was told that Camp Lejune {USMC}cease the operations. Now, local RR took the responsibility.
There has not been an active rail operation at Redstone Arsenal, AL, for many years. The tracks were torn out long ago.
The Army Reserve rail unit in Middletown, CT, the 1205th Transportation Railway Operating Battalion, was inactivated by September 2006 as part of a force reorganization focusing on deployable units. The 1205th had no deployment capability and was organized solely to augment existing civilian rail employees at Military Ocean Terminal Sunny Point (MOTSU), NC, about 25 miles south of Wilmington, NC. By the time of its inactivation it only had about 50 authorized slots, having lost about 100 when a subordinate unit at MOTSU split off to become the separate 1355th Transportation Railway Operating Company. Many years ago the 1205th’s small number of track maintainers did some weekend work on the Valley Railroad in CT but those days are long gone. The unit also had rail operations personnel but very few, if any, equipment repairmen. Interestingly enough, the Army Reserve has never modified or updated the webpage advertising enlistment opportunities in the now-inactive 1205th. The 1205th’s officer who originally set up the website, before it was taken over by the Reserve, noted that the Reserve webmasters were very unresponsive in posting changes, updates, etc., as the casual observer can now see.
The 1205th TROB did not get mobilized for the invasion and occupation of Iraq. There was no need to send it to MOTSU and, as noted above, it was not configured for overseas deployments. Some of its personnel, however, had training or experience in other career fields and were transferred to deploying non-rail units to fill manpower gaps.
The 226th Transportation Company (Railway), based at Westover Air Reserve Base in Chicopee, MA, was attached to the 1205th for admin purposes but has a completely different configuration and is organized for overseas deployment. It still exists today as a separate company. It was not mo
[quote user=“VilePig”]
There has not been an active rail operation at Redstone Arsenal, AL, for many years. The tracks were torn out long ago.
The Army Reserve rail unit in Middletown, CT, the 1205th Transportation Railway Operating Battalion, was inactivated by September 2006 as part of a force reorganization focusing on deployable units. The 1205th had no deployment capability and was organized solely to augment existing civilian rail employees at Military Ocean Terminal Sunny Point (MOTSU), NC, about 25 miles south of Wilmington, NC. By the time of its inactivation it only had about 50 authorized slots, having lost about 100 when a subordinate unit at MOTSU split off to become the separate 1355th Transportation Railway Operating Company. Many years ago the 1205th’s small number of track maintainers did some weekend work on the Valley Railroad in CT but those days are long gone. The unit also had rail operations personnel but very few, if any, equipment repairmen. Interestingly enough, the Army Reserve has never modified or updated the webpage advertising enlistment opportunities in the now-inactive 1205th. The 1205th’s officer who originally set up the website, before it was taken over by the Reserve, noted that the Reserve webmasters were very unresponsive in posting changes, updates, etc., as the casual observer can now see.
The 1205th TROB did not get mobilized for the invasion and occupation of Iraq. There was no need to send it to MOTSU and, as noted above, it was not configured for overseas deployments. Some of its personnel, however, had training or experience in other career fields and were transferred to deploying non-rail units to fill manpower gaps.
The 226th Transportation Company (Railway), based at Westover Air Reserve Base in Chicopee, MA, was attached to the 1205th for admin purposes but has a completely different configuration and is organized for overseas deployment. It still exists today as a separate compan