Saturday Switching On The Portland Secondary
274 views · Published 9 February 2017 · 11:14 · Indexed 20 September 2026
Channel: Austin Trains · 2017 · Autos & Vehicles
First I got a rare catch of a GATX EMD SW1500 switcher that the Con-Agra mill uses to sort grain cars for the H71. The neat thing is that they don't even drive it from the cab - The engineer sits on the front and uses a remote control! Shortly after, the H76 came along with a hopper "sandwiched" between two ex Conrail EMDs - bound for the Ultra-Poly plant in Portland. The steep track that runs into the plant only gets run on twice a year at the most, which explains the heavy amount of rust on the rails and the bushes and trees scraping the sides of the train as it passed! Shortly after they pulled out the other hopper, they left in the opposite direction "long hood forward." Sadly, I wasn't able to catch it.
