POTD: Blending into Plain Sight

Photo: Frank Keller

Sometimes railroad photography is nothing but a locomotive and a frame, or even a simple headlight or a machine used to create one special part for one piece the railroad simply couldn't do without. Other times you have to search for a sign of the railroad in the photograph. It seems that sometimes it's far afield, still others it's right in front of you and you wouldn't know it. In this case on the Joint Line, it's both.

On the cool morning of October 24, 2010, the bright orange of this BNSF coal train blends in with the autumn brush colors as it descends from Monument below the watchful gaze of the Rampart Range and the northern reaches of the Air Force Academy grounds along the Rio Grande right-of-way. The other half of the Joint Line, the Santa Fe right-of-way, is in the immediate foreground, abandoned 41 years ago, with a handful of pilings and a single bent showing the former trestle site for what it is.◊