POTD - One Train

I've had this idea for a theme of POTD, and I'm going to try it out. It's simple:

One train.

That's it. One train for the week. Obviously, we'd need five photos, and not just any photos. Five good photos that show different aspects. What's even better? The guy doesn't even know he did it for me.

Kevin and I have spoke very seldom, but he knows I am a fan. If you've read here for any period, you'd know it too. His web exposure is great because he has his own web site. This site lets you do searches by railroad, location, and even by weather. He e-mails his subscribers when he has new work, describing--sometimes in great detail--his shots and the stories behind them. He's doing what he can to get a core of loyal followers that take an interest in his work. Is he a regular producer? No, but if your work is of sufficient quality, that shouldn't matter. My point in this little diatribe is that it takes more than a good camera and average skills in railroad photography to make things happen.

In the decades before the internet, it took photographers the effort to find receptive clubs to come display their work, to sit down and organize their slides in trays, then haul them off in their car to the club meeting place, usually in the dead of winter, set up a projector and sit in the dark with a bunch of other grown men, and even women, and put your talent on display in front of everyone. Today, it requires a little less physical work, but effort is still a vital part. Learn how to use the tools like Blogger, Twitter, Flickr/SmugMug, Facebook, FeedBurner, Constant Contact, web forums and other, often free tools to increase your ability to interact and bring out your better photos. Making full use of the internet can change everything for you as a photographer and artist.

Diatribe over. Thanks!

Today's Photo of the Day is the basic high-angle, shot from a hill, overpass or other feature that enables a high view showing the tops of the locomotives and cars. Shot usually from the same side as sunlight, the effect is to show the train in the context of it's route. Interesting features of landscape fall second to the features of the train itself. This particular shot has the added benefit of the train curving between two trees that create a natural frame for the shot. The train is now part of the land, not just passing over or through it. What looks like just a shot of train at first glance is instead a carefully composed subject in its context.

Time: 11:52 AM

BNSF Double stacks are rare on the Front Range of Colorado
but this train seems as much a part of the land as the earth itself
Photo: Kevin Morgan

Amtrak's California Zephyr Hits Crane, Derails - 22 Hurt

Photo: Nebraska State Patrol

Amtrak's California Zephyr left Colorado and ran into a crane. That's essentially what happened to Thursday's train out of Denver in the early morning hours of today in Benkelman, Nebraska. At least 22 people were injured. The AP has the complete story.

POTD - Beneath One Bridge and Over Another

Rounding out this week's theme for Photo of the Day of Tennessee Pass, Carl Weber returns to Colorado Railroads with a worthy photo indeed! How could I not include Red Cliff? Those who haven't been, should, despite the lack of rail traffic. The town is as aptly named as any. Good way to go out on a Friday.

It's September 4, 1990 and the warmth belies the proximity to autumn and aspen gold.
Rio Grande SD40T-2 5379 passes beneath the soaring US 24 bridge at Red Cliff, Colorado
Photo: Carl Weber, B_And_A_Fan collection

PS: If you love Tunnel Motors, check out 5379's factory fresh paint job in 1977.

POTD - Minturn Years Later and Months Before

We are in Minturn for the second time this week for Photo of the Day and our theme of Tennessee Pass. This time, however, we are only a few months away from the Southern Pacific merger with the Union Pacific, 5 years to the day before 9/11.

The sun glares off the remarkably clean and unaltered nose of Geep 3099 as
she leads a colorful consist and train into the yard at Minturn in July 1996.
Photo: John Jauchler

POTD - At the Summit, Cresting the Continent

Colorado Railroads continues the theme of Tennessee Pass for Photo of the Day by going to the summit of Tennessee Pass, where a tunnel pierces the divide, emerging after half a mile on the other side of the pass.

Railblazer is a veritable shrine to the Rio Grande. It hasn't been updated in 4 years and the photos are small by today's standards, yet I can't help but go to it to find vintage photos of the Grande in her glory.

Geep 3117 a GP40-2 is westbound on Tennessee Pass in September 1980.
In seconds, she'll plunge with her stable-mates into the tunnel beneath the summit
Photo: Railblazer

POTD - Has Anyone Seen My Right-of-way?

It's hard to believe that only 10 years before this photo was taken, this right-of-way was part of a well-maintained transcontinental railroad system, a vital national link carrying goods and commodities from Pueblo and points east to Salt Lake City and points west. In 2006, It's hard to see it among the weeds as nature attempts to reclaim the land for its own use.

A ballast train eases itself along the weed-choked main at first is east of MP 325
east of Eagle,Colorado on June 29, 2006. Rusted rails makes you go slow as snails
Photo: Todd Busse

PS: If you'd like to see more of Todd's trip, he posted some of his photos on RailroadForums.com.

Mudhen 463 Frame Mated To Boiler In Mammoth Crane Event

Some great news has come out of Monte Vista this month! Denver & Rio Grande Western steam engine 463 has taken a major step in her return to steam. The frame and boiler were finally mated back together at last. Everything appears to be on schedule for the K-27 class Mudhen to return to steam at the beginning of the 2012 Cumbres & Toltec Scenic Railroad summer season.

POTD - Theme of the Week - Tennessee Pass

This fourth week of August, our POTD theme is Tennessee Pass. I know that a lot of folks would like to see the line return to service. Conversely, I know a lot of Eagle valley residents would just as soon it never run again. Yet Minturn was a railroad town from the start, and that's where we start today. Tomorrow, we'll visit Eagle.

EMD SD45 #5319 pulls into Minturn, a crew change point, on 11/12/76.
Rebuilt to SD40M-2 by MK Rail, she now works for the UP as 4704.
Photo: John Carr, CarrTracks Data: UtahRails.Net

Colorado Railroad Museum To Lay 300 Feet of Track August 27th

This next Saturday, August 27th, Colorado Railroad Museum will be laying 300 feet of track in one day, with some help. Here's the news straight from the Telegrapher,

FasTracks West Rail Line Contractors and Denver Transit Construction Group are donating all the materials, including track, ties, and ballast, equipment, and labor to build 300 feet of standard gauge track in a single day.

POTD - 737 Fuselages Rolling On Steel Wheels Make a Sight

There's something about loading a main battle tank on a plane, or a train crossing a bay by ferry, or more commonly, containers shifting from ship to train to tractor-trailer. It's a mixing of modes, showing that one mode just isn't going to make it all the way there. A hatch of 737-8 fuselages, still fetal but leaving no guess as to what they are, traveling by train is perhaps the oddest pairing. Rails are extremely efficient, yet confined to the path laid down. Jet flight is very inefficient but offers freedom in all 3 dimensions, yaw, pitch and roll. Juxtaposing the two is our Picture of the Day.

Boeing's latest iteration of the venerable 737 makes it's journey from Kansas City
to Denver strapped securely aboard the spacious and quiet flatbed cars of BNSF
Photo: Joe Blackwell

I'm Still Gathering Steam

Well, guys and gals, I'm still catching up from this weekend. Sorry there is no POTD yesterday or today. I don't travel well like I used to, so what looked like a simple trip on Sunday afternoon became something I needed all of yesterday to recover from. It's very frustrating, but it can't be helped, I guess. Thanks for your patience while I gather some steam to tackle the rest of the week.

POTD - Silent Testimony in Buena Vista

Editors note: POTD continues, but after today, most will have a photo and a brief caption without the essay. Essays need to be fact-checked for accuracy, each of which can require significant blocks of time.

Life in Buena Vista since 1997 has been considerably quieter than the previous century, thanks to the Union Pacific's decision to mothball the Tennessee Pass route in favor of the Moffat Tunnel route. It's been considerably cleaner, as well. In the 40s and 50s, the Rio Grande's monster steam engines caused a smoky haze to hang over the entire Arkansas River valley, causing respiratory issues for soldiers training at nearby Camp Hale.

Such days seem foreign to the summer scene below captured by Adam Lutt. The Rio Grande bridge has eluded the paint cans of Southern Pacific and--thus far--Union Pacific. The former main line has sat dormant for so long that nearly all the kids in this scene have never seen a coal or TOFC unit train come through this valley. The thrum of diesel engines, the rumble of a rail grinder, and the chuffing of iron horses are all as foreign as can be from this simple day playing in the creek, their echo fading from human memory as the paint slowly fades from the bridge above. It's only a matter of time before the railroad vanishes completely from Tennessee Pass, a matter of time, and money, unless a client develops on these once-heavily traveled rails or Union Pacific gets serious about preserving and maintaining their future options. Yet if they do, they could just as easily paint over the bridge's Rio Grande lettering altogether, disturbing the nostalgic reverie of Grande Fans like me.

I think I'll go skip a rock.

Locals and their guests play beneath a railroad bridge of the Rio Grande in a tame
and cool Arkansas River in Buena Vista, strictly a summer activity in Chaffee County
Photo: Adam Lutt