Forgotten Lands, Places and Transit

January 7th, 2008 was the apex of an unseasonably warm early January weather pattern in the Chicago area. Chicago’s official site for weather observations, O’Hare airport, recorded a record high of 65 degrees that day, just two degrees shy of the all-time high temperature for the entire month of January. Nearby, Gary, Indiana hit  70 degrees  that day.  Meteorologists had been predicting rain and thunderstorms in a pattern more typical of early May than January, but early on, no one could foresee that tornadoes would be accompanying the storms. As the storms intensified and fired up over central Illinois,  Tornado Watch #1 and #2 were issued for central and northern Illinois/southeast Wisconsin.  The National Weather Service numbers tornado watches sequentially across the entire United States each year, and this was the first time that the first and second tornado watches of the year occurred in Illinois, as the only area of the US where tornadoes are common in ...

The US railroad network is an engineering marvel. And just as important to the industry as the rails themselves are its rolling stock. After all, without railcars, the rails would be nothing but iron. But the demand for railcars is not constant, and different kinds of cars are needed at different points of the year. While the exact number of railcars in service in North American railroads and holding companies isn't known, it's about 1.6 million. On any given day however, about 900,000 won't move . While many of these are simply waiting in large railyards, many more are redundant at certain points of the year, and yet will be needed in the future. Thus, there is a market for train tracks to hold excess cars. While many of these can be stored away in yards, an alternative to placing a line out of service or abandoning it outright is to lease the space and store railcars and other rolling stock on it. However, the practice isn't without controversy. Some of these c...

Union Pacific 4014, better known as Big Boy , is one of 25 4-8-8-4 locomotives manufactured for UP between 1941-44. Of these 25, only eight are still around, and of those eight, only one, 4014, is in operating condition. UP 4014 at West Chicago after stopping for what will be a three night stay. Big Boy got its name from an unknown worker who wrote the phrase on the front of 4000, and is currently the largest operating steam engine in the world. Big Boy heading westbound on the south track at West Chicago station, greeted by thousands of onlookers, drones and even a helicopter. Letting off steam after parking. It is difficult to get the entire thing in one photo! Now once again in operation, Union Pacific is showing it off across the western United States. It was at Promontory for the 150th Anniversary of the Transcontinental Railroad , and moved as far east as Milwaukee. I guess I was a little too  close. You can really feel the heat emanating from this...

The Lucin Cutoff is today’s Union Pacific mainline across the Great Salt Lake between Lucin and Ogden, UT, and remains an incredible feat of engineering even to this day.  Construction of the Lucin Cutoff The Cutoff was built by the Southern Pacific in 1904, and at 102 miles in length, it shaved 44 miles off of the Original Transcontinental Railroad route, and also featured an easier grade, only having to traverse over water as opposed to varying land.  Laying track on the wooden trestle of the original grade. The original route was only used for local farming customers and passengers, while mainline traffic used the Cutoff.  What had originated thanks to a war was also abandoned as a result of war. The Transcontinental Railroad's original alignment around the Great Salt Lake would be abandoned in its entirety in 1942, with the iron rails reclaimed to aid in the effort of World War II, with the exception of the area around Promontory Point, which is now part of Golden ...

The Nevada Central Railway was a narrow gauge railway that connected the silver mines at Austin, NV with the Transcontinental Railroad at Battle Mountain, NV, a distance of 93 miles. Nevada Central Railroad, Engine #5, ca. 1890. University of Nevada-Reno Collection. Built in 1880, the line was a little late to the silver boom, which ended in the late 1880’s. The line had been approved by the Nevada Legislature in 1874, but construction wouldn't even begin until late in 1878.  Unfortunately for the railroad, it only gained profitability if the mines at Austin were producing full loads, which was rarely the case. In 1881, it was sold to the Union Pacific Railroad , with whom it interchanged with at Battle Mountain, but UP ran it as an independent company.  The idea was an ill-conceived scheme on behalf of the UP to build a line through Central Nevada during the silver boom, but as the boom ended soon after acquisition, UP instead allowed the road to go into bankruptcy in 1884....

The Laramie North Park & Western Railroad connected Laramie, WY with Coalmont, CO along a 112 mile route that ran through incredibly treacherous terrain. ( Right of way ) Laying rail for the LHP&P  (Wyoming Tales & Trails) It was established in 1901 as The Laramie Hahns Peak & Pacific Railway, it was built to tap into the mining interests of Southern Wyoming, and was later extended down to Colorado at a steep price. Initially, however, it was planned to extend much farther south and west, with over 500 route miles planned, although none would be constructed beyond Coalmont. "By the time the rail line reached Centennial in 1907, the town's latest mining boom was fading, so the company's owners turned their sights to black gold. Coal seams near the southern end of the Medicine Bows beckoned, and the LHP&P followed. The rail line turned south through the mountains, reaching appropriately named Coalmont, Colo., in 1911." ( Rails to Trails ) Map of por...

The Boise Nampa & Owyhee Railway was a line running between Nampa and Murphy, ID, about 29 miles south from Nampa. First constructed in 1896 with operations beginning the year afterward, it transported livestock, wool, and ore from the mining camps near Murphy to a junction with the Union Pacific Railroad at Nampa. ( Right of way ) One of the towns between the enpoints was Guffey, on the Snake River. According to IDGenWeb , Guffey was created as the terminal point of the railroad. A railroad bridge across the Snake River was completed in 1897. On May 27 of that year, the first building in Guffey was erected by Fred Brunzell. Several businesses were added in 1897 and 1898, mostly involved in the transfer of freight from the railroad to wagons and stages going on to the mining district around Silver City, and beyond. Guffey Bridge over the Snake River. Photo c.1923 via BridgeHunter Sold to the Idaho Northern Railway in 1907, which later became part of the Union Pacific in an inten...