Warren Buffet Buys Burlington Northern

[MountainMan]

Buffet bought a railroad. Turns out that we all know exactly which railroad, despite all the resultant hullabaloo about exact semantics, which merely proves that railroad enthusiasts know a lot more about railroad specifics than some clueless media hack, which is a given at any time, anyway.

Since the BNSF runs down the valley a mile or so from my home and right through nearby Palmer Lake, I'll be watching it to see what changes, if any, take place. Which reminds me, can someone tell me why a diesel loco is left parked on a spur along a heavily traveled mainline? Is it a spare to replace a breakdown? It's not a helper, because it isn't added or subtracted from the consist at Monument Pass, which coincides geographically with Palmer Lake.

For a while, it was an older unit, but recently a brand new EMD unit was set out. It displays low level lights at night, but isn't running and doesn't seem to move until it is swapped out for a different unit. I'm sure the explanation is simple, but I'm a 1900's steam guy, not a 21st century diesel operations type.

[tetters]

It's actually parked there by a covert government agency based out of Area 51 to conduct alien expereiments and surveillance on the area. Word has it there are aliens within the local population who look like humans but they're not. Look out for any Men in Black. :?

[Russ Bellinis]

Buffet bought a railroad. Turns out that we all know exactly which railroad, despite all the resultant hullabaloo about exact semantics, which merely proves that railroad enthusiasts know a lot more about railroad specifics than some clueless media hack, which is a given at any time, anyway.

Since the BNSF runs down the valley a mile or so from my home and right through nearby Palmer Lake, I'll be watching it to see what changes, if any, take place. Which reminds me, can someone tell me why a diesel loco is left parked on a spur along a heavily traveled mainline? Is it a spare to replace a breakdown? It's not a helper, because it isn't added or subtracted from the consist at Monument Pass, which coincides geographically with Palmer Lake.

For a while, it was an older unit, but recently a brand new EMD unit was set out. It displays low level lights at night, but isn't running and doesn't seem to move until it is swapped out for a different unit. I'm sure the explanation is simple, but I'm a 1900's steam guy, not a 21st century diesel operations type.

Is there any sort of industry or branchline at the location where it is parked? If not, and there is a grade nearby, it may be as you suggest a spare in case a locomotive fails just before starting up the grade. Typically the railroad knows exactly how much power to weight a train needs to climb any grade on the railroad. They don't generally add extra power to the train unless they need to move excess power to another part of the railroad, and then they would be more likely to use a light engine move. If the train left the yard with just enough power to climb the hill, and one unit broke down having an extra unit on stand-by at that siding would save a lot of time and hassle. This would be especially true if the nearest yard was quite a ways away from the location. Also it would cost a lot less for the engine crew to park the train nearby, get out of the locomotive and start up the spare and move it to hook up to the train rather than having an extra crew bring another locomotive out in a light engine move to hook up to the train, in which case you now have an extra crew on the clock going as far as that engine needs to go before they can get off and catch another train home.

[MountainMan]

It's actually parked there by a covert government agency based out of Area 51 to conduct alien expereiments and surveillance on the area. Word has it there are aliens within the local population who look like humans but they're not. Look out for any Men in Black. :?

Of course....that explains the huge probe mounted on the front! The lights, of course, would be "back-up" lights.

[MountainMan]

Is there any sort of industry or branchline at the location where it is parked? If not, and there is a grade nearby, it may be as you suggest a spare in case a locomotive fails just before starting up the grade. Typically the railroad knows exactly how much power to weight a train needs to climb any grade on the railroad. They don't generally add extra power to the train unless they need to move excess power to another part of the railroad, and then they would be more likely to use a light engine move. If the train left the yard with just enough power to climb the hill, and one unit broke down having an extra unit on stand-by at that siding would save a lot of time and hassle. This would be especially true if the nearest yard was quite a ways away from the location. Also it would cost a lot less for the engine crew to park the train nearby, get out of the locomotive and start up the spare and move it to hook up to the train rather than having an extra crew bring another locomotive out in a light engine move to hook up to the train, in which case you now have an extra crew on the clock going as far as that engine needs to go before they can get off and catch another train home.

Not really. A siding and a cross-over nearby. I'll try to capture a Google Earth image of it.

Dang - didn't work. OK - here it is. This image isn't up to date, but the marked siding is where they park it.

[sgtcarl1]

Actually, I have seen that very thing right close to where I live. I discovered, by being nosey, that sometimes locos are parked in such areas so they can be serviced. I observed the crew, while they serviced the engine, swapped out air filters, and did a thorough check of everything else. The foreman said that for every week an engine ran, it needed to be sidelined and serviced, which took eight to ten hours, minimum. (NS believes in taking care of their equipment.) The service was being done by a subcontrator. He had 12 people on his crew, and they were all busy.

[Russ Bellinis]

Actually, I have seen that very thing right close to where I live. I discovered, by being nosey, that sometimes locos are parked in such areas so they can be serviced. I observed the crew, while they serviced the engine, swapped out air filters, and did a thorough check of everything else. The foreman said that for every week an engine ran, it needed to be sidelined and serviced, which took eight to ten hours, minimum. (NS believes in taking care of their equipment.) The service was being done by a subcontrator. He had 12 people on his crew, and they were all busy.

I hadn't thought of that. I thought that BNSF did all of their own service work; but, if they have a small terminal with a handfull of locomotives that is too far from a major servicing facility, I could see them doing minor service work on a siding. If the work is being farmed out to a subcontractor, it also makes sense to do it on a siding away from a busy yard where the workmen doing the service would need to know the blue flag laws, and be watchfull for approaching trains while working.

[MountainMan]

No servicing has been observed. There are no BNSF facilities whatsoever in Palmer Lake. The buildings you see belong to small civilian outfits who rent space, except the one by itself to the left, where they manufacture those portable horse fences, cow clampers and similar stiff out of metal tubing.

[Trolleyfan]

Nice read and they called it BNSF..

Of course savvy railfans knows what BNSF really means:Buy Norfolk Southern First.

I was told it stood for Big Noisy Stinky Fellas by one railfan (actually not 'fellas', but I gotta keep it clean here).

Greg Melby
Seattle, WA.

[BR60103]

Railroad personnel are known for retaining archaic names for locations. Interchanges will still be known as the Central or the Pennsy track, especially if there is still another track for the other line.
My sister moved to a new town (small city?) about 18 years ago. She gets really frustrated at directions that involve "where the hockey rink burned down" and "where the Canadian Tire was".

[Brakie]

Nice read and they called it BNSF..

Of course savvy railfans knows what BNSF really means:Buy Norfolk Southern First.

I was told it stood for Big Noisy Stinky Fellas by one railfan (actually not 'fellas', but I gotta keep it clean here).

Greg Melby
Seattle, WA.

[Russ Bellinis]

No servicing has been observed. There are no BNSF facilities whatsoever in Palmer Lake. The buildings you see belong to small civilian outfits who rent space, except the one by itself to the left, where they manufacture those portable horse fences, cow clampers and similar stiff out of metal tubing.

I suspect it is a spare set out to be used as a helper on the grade then if one of the locomotives in use on the train fails before they get tot he hill.

[MountainMan]

That's what I thought, but the last time a unit borke down a couple of miles north of Castle Roack, BNSF halted all traffic on the line and brought out a repair crew to fix it on-site. The "spare" never moved.