#Burlington Northern Santa Fe

[20th-century-railroading]

Grinding around Breezy Point by Mike Danneman Via Flickr: Four Burlington Northern GE C30-7s pull hard on a PSCX coal train rounding Breezy Point west of Belmont, Nebraska, on the climb over Crawford Hill on July 7, 1996. In the background on the other side of the horseshoe curve is the end of the train and a helper set of three EMD SD40-2 and a fuel tender.

[aryburn-trains]

DPU pushers on KLBCH-19 from Long Beach to 59th Street in Chicago pass by the BNSF Christmas train. These two trains will follow each other up into Cajon in the following hour. Meanwhile, the trailers on the left are on a westbound BNSF train that is crawling through A Yard (and may have reached B Yard by this time too) having just come down out of Cajon Pass on its way into LA Basin. It's a busy day at San Bernardino. December 19, 2009

[aryburn-kc]

Burlington Northern BN SD70MAC 9444 Kansas City Missouri by John Rus Via Flickr: On May 4, 1997, three year old Burlington Northern SD70MAC 9444 leads a southbound loaded coal train near BN X-ing on the Ft. Scott Sub, Kansas City, Missouri. From BN’s last order for new locomotives, (350 units numbered 9400-9749, all SD70MAC’s) before the BNSF merger, 9444 was built in April, 1994.

[artistmacposts]

#trains Burlington Northern Santa Fe, Rock Island, Milwaukee Road Metra, Amtrak Trains, 5/16/2023

[trainmaniac]

NS Wood Chip Train by Joe the Photog Via Flickr: This NS wood chip train in 2011 had both BNSF and UP power.

[harlander]

Passing a BNSF freight train on the Empire Builder in Eastern Montana

(Sound on)

[pyro-hairedguy]

Did a little bit of holiday foaming

[zponds]

rini: what is the railroad history of the santa fe?

Well, Rini��� it’s quite a long story, but I’ll give you a brief but important summary…

The Santa Fe was one of the largest railroads in the United States, having railroad lines that reached from San Francisco to Los Angeles to Phoenix to Grand Canyon to Houston to Kansas City to Chicago. Their top passenger trains and streamliners were a series of Chiefs, with one being the Super Chief. However, by December 31st, 1996, Santa Fe merged with Burlington Northern, forming the Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railway, or for short, BNSF.

[cctinsleybaxter]

xmas present for my grandpa :+)

[20th-century-railroading]

Santa Fe all the way westbound on the Arizona Divide at Riordan, Arizona, circa 1998

[aryburn-trains]

February 2, 2024 Illinois Zephyr #380 Quincy to Chicago Amtrak The consist includes a BNSF SD70ACe, a SC44, two Siemens coaches and an Amfleet I business class cafe. Once again, the new Siemens chargers need rescued. What's new? The gifs used were made by Jack, Ken and myself. They can be found at the link below. My gifs have my name in the description. http://kenstransitgifs.com/gifindex.html

[aryburn-kc]

BNSF6116eKC3-99 by Joseph Blackwell Via Flickr: BNSF 6116 was leading a BNSF Argentine yard to Murray yard transfer in the bottoms area of Kansas City, KS

[nicksbloggingadventures]

Burlington Northern Santa Fe Diesel coming by!! :-)

[tronmike82]

Spotted bnsf locos 1667 & 1618 (both SD40-2s) double-heading a short freight train through El Mirage, Arizona. The last couple cars were empty bulkhead flatcars, which leads me to believe they were bringing an empty train back to the yard after dropping off their freight.

[amtrak-official]

Funny Railroad words that people should know to understand what I am Talking about, Feel Free to add in any terms I missed:

Gauge-the Width of the Track, specifically the distance between the two rails, trains can only run on Gauges they were designed for

ROW-Right of Way, The place a track runs

RTs-Round Trips-times a train goes both to and from a destination in one day

Rolling Stock-the physical cars that are used for trains

Livery-the exterior pattern on a Train

HSR-High Speed Rail, any section of rail that goes over 155 mph

Higher Speed rail- any section of rail that goes between 90 and 154 mph

Class 1 railroad- any railroad that makes more than 500 million annually, they are a set of 6 monopolies that control US Freight

Freight-Cargo and goods that are moved by Rail

Passenger Rail-Rail that moves solely Passengers

Conrail-A public freight company run by the government in the 70s that was bought out by CSX

CSX- one of the 2 large Freight Railroads in the Eastern US

Norfolk Southern-The other Freight Railroad in the Eastern US

BNSF-Burlington Northern Santa Fe-One of the 2 Big Freight Railroads in the Western US

UP-Union Pacific-The other Western Freight Railroad

[littlewestern]

I just thought of something. For your silver and black stories, how did Pilot, Pioneer, and 2903 react when Burlington Northern Santa Fe was created? I mean, their home railroads are now one and the same! (Makes one wonder how preserved trains would feel about their railroads merging out of existence. I imagine 999 has certain feelings about Penn Central and Conrail)

Oh this is a really interesting question!

I think by 1994 all the engines mentioned had come to terms with the fact that rail industry had simply changed so much in the past 60 years that it wasn't worth getting too sentimental over. Since they all were retired by the '70s, I think the more affecting change would have been the CB&Q becoming Burlington Northern.

It's important to note up-top that engines are familiar with change and know well that their entire industry is founded on shifting sand. CB&Q engines and Zephyrs in particular would know this well, and would be more sensitive to the ways in which the Q would adjust their marketing and scheduling strategies based on cost and changing customer expectations. Basically, all engines know going in that things are subject to change, sometimes at a moment's notice, and for the most part they aren't too sentimental about it. It's just the way of things, y'know?

That being said, I do think that the absorption of the Q into Burlington Northern would have been a somewhat sobering moment for Pioneer in particular, which may or may not be surprising depending on how well you know him. It's not like it ruined his day to hear the news or anything, but you have to remember that the Pioneer Zephyr defined the entire look of last third of the CB&Q's lifespan. The Zephyrs got people excited to take the train and set the tone for how every other railway in the country would market their passenger rail service for the next 30-some-odd years. Pioneer wasn't just important to the Q, he was important to the culture. But by the time 1970 rolls around, he's been out of service for a decade, and rail travel looks significantly different to what it once did. Losing the Q to consolidation is a sign of the times and a tacit remark on the then current state of rail travel.

It would have been, at the very least, the end of an era, and that in and of itself deserves a moment of recognition. It's not sad exactly, because change is inevitable, and it's not worrying exactly either, because Pioneer himself was built and born of time of uncertainty - only to eventually become a symbol that the future of travel was brighter than ever! But it is the way of things, and I think it would have at least given Pioneer some pause.

Pilot on the other hand, would have seen this one coming. After all, his retirement marked the end of the Zephyrs outside of the California Zephyr. He would have been familiar with the decline in passenger service quality from the time he was built in 1940 to the day the Zephyr service ended in 1968. Where Pioneer was only watching this change happen gradually from the outside, Pilot would have lived it.

I'm not sure how much loyalty 2903 would have felt to the culture of the AT&SF, given that he was built so late, was part of such a small class, and honestly didn't even work for that long. I do think, like most engines, he would have felt a sense of pride in his heritage and there might have even been some light ribbing in the MSI yard about how at least the Santa Fe was still going strong even as the Q had to forfeit its identity, but I don't know that the creation of BNSF would have inspired anything in him besides some slight annoyance when the teasing was turned back around on him. "Guess you're a Burlington engine now, chief!" Cue eyeroll. 2903 has never really appreciated the Burlington approach.

As for 999, oh boy lol! Don't even get her started. Her feelings on the NYC and Penn could be a whole essay unto themselves. Suffice to say that they are mixed. The best favor NYC ever did her was retire her before they became the Penn so she wouldn't have to share the name of the railway that scrapped nearly every single one of their steam engines.