Photo ID: 106445 Date Shot Photo By Wednesday, February 15, 2017 Kevin Morgan Location Times Viewed Chemical (MP 14.5) Arvada, CO 1280 (Add a Comment) Subdivision Railroad Moffat Tunnel (UP) Union Pacific A beautiful February morning for a Colorado coal load! I hope you'll forgive the multiple (similar) shots of coal trains lately, but coal trains are starting to feel like a novelty on the Moffat. Back in 2004, the Moffat was seeing an average of 19 coal trains (that's loads and empties) per day. Now, 13 years later, it is seeing an average of 1 coal train per day, or a single load every other day. And with a few more contracts nearing their expiration, it is likely to only get worse. Email Questions or Comments to the Webmaster or add a comment to the picture. Photo ID: 106444 Date Shot Photo By Wednesday, February 15, 2017 Kevin Morgan Location Times Viewed Chemical (MP 14.5) Arvada, CO 1261 (Add a Comment) Subdivision Railroad Moffat Tunnel (UP) Union Pacific An eastbound coal loaded headed for the Colorado Plains heads toward a clear intermediate signal west of Leyden. This is the first coal load to come east off the North Fork Branch since February 9th. It is also only the fourth coal load to come east off the North Fork Branch for the month of February thus far! Email Questions or Comments to the Webmaster or add a comment to the picture. Photo ID: 106440 Date Shot Photo By Monday, February 13, 2017 Kevin Morgan Location Times Viewed Chemical (MP 14.5) Arvada, CO 1231 (Add a Comment) Subdivision Railroad Moffat Tunnel (UP) Union Pacific Just west of the west switch of Leyden, an eastbound coal train approaches a clear signal. An ES44AC and a AC4400CW lead up the train. Email Questions or Comments to the Webmaster or add a comment to the picture. Photo ID: 106390 Date Shot Photo By Wednesday, January 25, 2017 Kevin Morgan Location Times Viewed Chemical (MP 14.5) Arvada, CO 1327 (Add a Comment) Subdivision Railroad Moffat Tunnel (UP) Union Pacific The West Local has an Advanced Approach (flashing yellow) signal at the intermediate west of Leyden. The train will head down the main at Rocky so it can get to the Rocky Spur, but DS-80 has not yet set up a signal at the east end of Rocky. If anything happens with the sole-remaining customer at the north end of the Rocky Spur, the West Local will fade into the history books. So I figure it is worth shooting now, as much as possible. On a side note, UP 1359 is ex-DRGW 3118! Email Questions or Comments to the Webmaster or add a comment to the picture. Photo ID: 106389 Date Shot Photo By Wednesday, January 25, 2017 Kevin Morgan Location Times Viewed Chemical (MP 14.5) Arvada, CO 1456 (Add a Comment) Subdivision Railroad Moffat Tunnel (UP) Union Pacific As luck would have it, the engineer on the West Local needed to throttle up a notch just as the West Local approached the camera! 10-15 years ago, the West Local would sometimes draw four geeps for power because the train could be 30-50 cars long. This was when Rocky Flats was still in its cleanup phase and Mesa Oil was still located west of Leyden. Now, however, the Rocky Flats cleanup project has long since been completed and Mesa Oil has moved, leaving only the aggregate plant at the north end of the Rocky Spur as the sole customer for the West Local. So why send three units to handle a single car? This same power is used on the South Local, which runs down to Sedalia on the Joint Line on Tuesdays and Thursdays. It is easier to just leave the power MU'd together for the trip west on Wednesday's. Email Questions or Comments to the Webmaster or add a comment to the picture. Photo ID: 106388 Date Shot Photo By Wednesday, January 25, 2017 Kevin Morgan Location Times Viewed Chemical (MP 14.5) Arvada, CO 1377 (Add a Comment) Subdivision Railroad Moffat Tunnel (UP) Union Pacific As time continue to march ever forward, the number of patched (but not yet repainted) units from the DRGW and Espee days continues to decrease. Whereas it was common to find at least one or two patched DRGW or Espee units on the West Local, all three of these units are now wearing Armour Yellow. Email Questions or Comments to the Webmaster or add a comment to the picture. Photo ID: 106387 Date Shot Photo By Wednesday, January 25, 2017 Kevin Morgan Location Times Viewed Chemical (MP 14.5) Arvada, CO 1354 (Add a Comment) Subdivision Railroad Moffat Tunnel (UP) Union Pacific Sadly, this is what the West Local has typically become...just a handful of cars (or, in this case, only one) for the one day per week trip west to the Rocky Spur. Email Questions or Comments to the Webmaster or add a comment to the picture. Photo ID: 106380 Date Shot Photo By Tuesday, January 24, 2017 Kevin Morgan Location Times Viewed Chemical (MP 14.5) Arvada, CO 1428 (Add a Comment) Subdivision Railroad Moffat Tunnel (UP) Union Pacific There is no doubt that GE has outperformed EMD for 30 years. Some railroads have all but sworn off EMD (CSX and, to a lesser extent, BNSF). UP, however, has continued to order from both manufacturers over the years, no doubt recognizing the benefits to keeping both builders in business! Here, an all-EMD led manifest heads east toward Denver on a clear signal. Email Questions or Comments to the Webmaster or add a comment to the picture. Photo ID: 106374 Date Shot Photo By Saturday, January 21, 2017 Kevin Morgan Location Times Viewed Chemical (MP 14.5) Arvada, CO 1246 (Add a Comment) Subdivision Railroad Moffat Tunnel (UP) BNSF In the late 1990s and early 2000s, BNSF would run its westbound manifests with a pair of manned helpers (typically SD40-2s) on the tail end. The helpers would cut off at East Portal and return light back to Denver. With the advancement and (general) reliability of DPU technology, it was a practice that only lasted a few years. Now you can usually expect to find 1-2 DPUs on the tail end of BNSF freight. Such is the case here as a pair of C44-9Ws give an assist to the Denver-Provo. Email Questions or Comments to the Webmaster or add a comment to the picture. Photo ID: 106372 Date Shot Photo By Saturday, January 21, 2017 Kevin Morgan Location Times Viewed Chemical (MP 14.5) Arvada, CO 1250 (Add a Comment) Subdivision Railroad Moffat Tunnel (UP) BNSF A pair of Warbonnets with the Colorado Rockies as a backdrop! True, one Warbonnet has an orange components behind the cab and another has some fire damage...but just getting such a shot in 2017 is a treat! Email Questions or Comments to the Webmaster or add a comment to the picture. Photo ID: 106371 Date Shot Photo By Saturday, January 21, 2017 Kevin Morgan Location Times Viewed Chemical (MP 14.5) Arvada, CO 1240 (Add a Comment) Subdivision Railroad Moffat Tunnel (UP) BNSF OUCH! Looks like this Warbonnet must've suffered from a fire under the long hood at some point. This unit was one of the final 20 Warbonnets delivered to BNSF. Bummer that it suffered from that fire. Still, always worth a roster shot of Warbonnet...why they are still around to be shoot! Before we know it, they will all be repainted. Email Questions or Comments to the Webmaster or add a comment to the picture. Photo ID: 106370 Date Shot Photo By Saturday, January 21, 2017 Kevin Morgan Location Times Viewed Chemical (MP 14.5) Arvada, CO 1314 (Add a Comment) Subdivision Railroad Moffat Tunnel (UP) BNSF Many railfans would argue that the Warbonnet scheme is the best scheme of any in history. It was wonderful when Santa Fe (and, for a brief time, BNSF) brought the scheme back in the 1990s. Considering the fact it has been 20 years, this Warbonnet is still looking mighty fine! Email Questions or Comments to the Webmaster or add a comment to the picture. Photo ID: 106369 Date Shot Photo By Saturday, January 21, 2017 Kevin Morgan Location Times Viewed Chemical (MP 14.5) Arvada, CO 1320 (Add a Comment) Subdivision Railroad Moffat Tunnel (UP) BNSF BNSF runs a manifest between Denver and Provo that frequently consists of large numbers of tank cars. A lot of these cars wind up at industries between Provo and Ogden. BNSF deliver the cars to Provo and then turns them over to Utah Railway. Utah Railway then delivers the cars to their respective customers...all this done via UP rails! Email Questions or Comments to the Webmaster or add a comment to the picture. Photo ID: 106352 Date Shot Photo By Monday, January 16, 2017 Kevin Morgan Location Times Viewed Chemical (MP 14.5) Arvada, CO 1004 (Add a Comment) Subdivision Railroad Moffat Tunnel (UP) BNSF I love winter in Colorado! The snowy landscape of the Moffat is just so photogenic. A westbound BNSF unit gondola copper train trudges slowly west on the approach to the east end of Barbara's Gulch. Email Questions or Comments to the Webmaster or add a comment to the picture. Photo ID: 106351 Date Shot Photo By Monday, January 16, 2017 Kevin Morgan Location Times Viewed Chemical (MP 14.5) Arvada, CO 1193 (Add a Comment) Subdivision Railroad Moffat Tunnel (UP) BNSF In addition to its standard manifest traffic on the Moffat, BNSF will occasionally send other trains over the Moffat. Such is the case on this snowy afternoon when BNSF ran a "copper train" west. The train is a unit train of open top gondolas, seen here between Leyden and Rocky. Email Questions or Comments to the Webmaster or add a comment to the picture.

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