Welcome to

As Sunday morning 9-28 was bright and sunny I decided to drive over to South Seattle and take some photos from the S 129th St overpass at the south end of the yard.  This area was called Allentown in NP days and the road bridge crosses the both the tracks and I-5 at this location.  The TOFC yard was built by the Northern Pacific in the late 1960′s but other than that operations in NP days are pretty much a mystery to me.  

The original NP main lines are now yard storage tracks as the new Main 1 and 2 are located where the old Pacific Coast tracks were.  Main 3 is the old UP line between Argo and Tukwila.  I had not photographed any trains here in the morning since the lines were reconfigured so I wanted to see how things looked now.  I arrived a bit after 09:30 AM and knew Amtraks Coast Starlight would soon be here.  The yard looked pretty empty to me.  I am guessing most of the buildings in the distance were constructed by the NP.  Mains 3 and 2 were in the shadows of trees but Main 1 was open.  I figured Amtrak should be on Main 1 but I was wrong.  At 09:53 it was by on Main 2 with units 131/87.

I had photographed here in the morning years ago when the old Main 1 and 2 were in use and the photos were much better.  The trees and shadows make morning photography here difficult.  Still I was hoping for a southbound freight to come along on Main 1 so I waited.  Soon I could hear power sneaking up on me from behind.  I watched as a northbound BNSF Roberts Bank coal train passed underneath the bridge at 10:15 AM on Main 1 with units 9652/6139 up front.

But with just two units on the head end DPU’s on the rear were likely so I waited until they came under the bridge and got lucky as both units, BNSF 9993/9757 were facing south. 

True the train is going away but it is not a bad shot.  I slowly made its way around the corner and stopped.  It was going to head into the holding tracks along Airport Way.  A BNSF GP38-2 came out with some cars to do some switching but I wasn’t very pleased with the photo I got so I waited until they started backing up to try again.  Then I saw another headlight to the north and realized it was on Main 3, the old UP tracks.  Talk about a tight shot!  Too bad too as it was a southbound BNSF garbage train with 2879/2095/6702/6797 leading.  All EMD’s.  But I took the shot anyway at 10:40 AM.

The BNSF switcher continued to back its cut of cars into the yard and I was happier with this shot as the train on Main 3 is in the photo as well. 

The sun was getting high so I decided to head for home as I had things to do.  Later that afternoon I went out to the Preston Cemetery east of Issaquah where my parents are buried to check on the grave and see if it needed any maintenance listening to the final Mariners game of the year.  That complete I headed back on I-90 into Seattle to see about photographing the BNSF GP38-2 that has been switching at Rabanco recently.  BNSF 2134 was shut down for the day making it easy to photograph.  It is the ex-BN 2134 and before that ex-SLSF 658.  It looked pretty nice in clean H1 paint.

Then it was to Argo where UP’s I-SEBA was preparing to head south with units 9677/3924.  It left town at 3:37 PM.

The 9677 is ex-CNW C44-9W 8613.  Down at the north end of South Seattle some power was being switched around.  Switching complete this fine looking lashup of EMD 9060/BNSF 8089/7010/7024 was the result but it wasn’t going anywhere as all four units were shut down. 

I kind of ignored the the other set of power for the later eastbound Z-train that was now 4 H2 C44-9W’s and an H2 SD60M.  A headlight appeared from the south and a stack train from Tacoma slowly approached.  I figured it would be heading into the holding tracks so I moved a bit to the north for a photo of it crossing over.

BNSF 4899/6359/8193/5431/847 led the train and here is a backed off view.

The time was 4:16 PM as train passed by me and I took this back shot.  I noticed the CSX stack car behind the power now says “CS Intermodal” so I am guessing CSX does not want to be associated with it anymore!

Before leaving for home I got one more shot of the EMD’s from the BNSF 7024 end. 

Kind of a nice way to end the day I thought!    

Late last week I heard that the MRL 319 was being released from CEECO in Tacoma and would soon be headed back to Montana.  This is the ex-MRL 7545 which was an ex-SP SD45R.  Figured it would leave on either Saturday or Sundays M-TACPAS out of Tacoma I decided to try my luck at catching it.

Saturday 9-6-08 I could hear the M-TACPAS preparing to leave as I neared Tacoma around 1:50 PM.  I drove straight to the overpass near Temco and waited on it there.  About 10 minutes later it slowly came around the curve with 4 BNSF SD40-2′s and no MRL unit.  Still worth a photo I figured.  First shot shows it passing by the site of the old NP Half Moon Yard that was to the right of the train at 2:10 PM.  Power is the 6785/6763/7055/8086.  Note the two dead TEMCO SW1200′s on the left.  Both are ex-NP leaving just one operating with the GP9 at the grain elevator.

Back shot shows the TEMCO grain elevator which is currently shut down for maintenance.  Odd not seeing any grain cars here!

I then headed for home with the intention of coming back down on Sunday again.

Next afternoon I was back in Tacoma around 1:00 PM and immediately saw how empty the yard was.  Plus I saw the MRL 319 was sitting alone well back in the yard where it could not be photographed.  One of the local train buffs told me there would be no TACPAS today as the yard had been emptied earlier this morning by a couple of other south bound freights.  Guess the MRL 319 would be leaving sometime during the coming week.  Guess I will have to hope to see it on the MRL now.

A work train was waiting out the weekend south of the yard office with a pair of ex-BN geeps, the 2813/2930.  As both were still in BN green I wanted a photo of them.

After getting home I checked on their history.  The 2813 is the ex-BN 2813, and the BN 2210 before rebuilding.  It was built as GN GP30 3010 in 1963. 

The 2930 is ex-Union Pacific GP35 753.   

A bit after 3:00 PM I finally heard a train was coming.  The UP 4697 South was calling the BNSF.  I walked up to the new D Street overpass to check it out.  A pair of Cascade Talgos went by (one north and one south) first before I saw the headlights of the southbound UP train approaching.  It was the U-SEGL garbage train and I first caught it passing the BNSF work train.

In the backed off shot you can see the MRL 319 on the left in the distance.  So open yet so far away. 

As UP SD70M’s 4697/4295/5050 passed underneath slowly the bridge the engineer opened the throttle and the train started to pick up speed.  The sound was great.

Then I noticed more headlights coming up alongside the UP train.  I set up for it and saw it was BNSF EMD’s leading a BNSF garbage train, probably the U-EVEROO.  BNSF 8018/6837/2721 was leading the southbound.

The BNSF train was already up to speed and was overtaking the UP train even as the power passed underneath.

It was quite a sight to see watching the BNSF train passing the UP.  Wonder where the BNSF power passed the UP’s power?  Now that would have been a great shot!  Also strange to see speeds so much higher thru the once 10 MPH curve.  One last shot of the two southbound garbage trains racing underneath and yes, the smell was twice as noticeable!  There was most definitely an “Aroma in Tacoma” with these two trains.

I figured nothing else would be by soon so I decided to head on home.  While I did not get to photograph the MRL 319 I sure can’t complain about all the other EMD’s I photographed the past few days!  Notice I didn’t photograph any BNSF H2 C44-9W’s this weekend?  Now that was nice.