Not far west of Cliff, the tracks cross South Beaver Creek Road and South Boulder Creek (the actual creek!). On a sunny Saturday morning, an on-time Zephyr crosses the bridge over a largely frozen South Boulder Creek.
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It is a chilly Thursday morning as light snow falls west of Denver. Moving at track speed, the westbound Zephyr kicks up a lot of snow as it cruises toward a clear intermediate signal at MP 14.5, just west of Leyden.
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Passing by milepost 6, the Zephyr accelerates up to track speed as it says goodbye to Denver. Just ahead at the overpass, the train will move in to the suburb of Arvada as it continues its journey west.
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The westbound Zephyr is running an hour late as it approaches the Tennyson Street grade crossing on Main 2. UP will do a great job of keeping the train running on clear signals and the train will be 9 minutes early by the time it reaches Reno, NV.
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Just west of C&S Junction, the westbound Zephyr accelerates on Main 2 as it approaches the Tennyson Street grade crossing. The train is likely filled with Thanksgiving travelers, heading back for home.
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The Zephyr typically only has seven Superliners through most of the winter months as business tends to slow down. However, during the busiest travel week of the year, the Zephyr has nine Superliners today as the train heads west toward Barbara's Gulch. The train will stop briefly at Rocky to check on an issue with the second unit.
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On a sunny morning, the westbound Zephyr passes by the red Rocky Flats gas mask horse located on the north side of the tracks along CO-72. The Zephyr has a typical pair of P42DCs leading it on its journey west.
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Running a little under 2 hours late, the westbound Zephyr charge out of Leyden and heads west toward Barbara's Gulch. Whereas once there was nothing but open fields on the south side of the tracks here, now, there are backyards a plenty from the new Leyden Rock development in western Arvada.
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Eight units lead this westbound coal empty as it crosses the 80th Avenue grade crossing and prepares to take the siding at Leyden. If you look closely in the rear view mirror, you can see a red over yellow (Diverging Approach) signal ahead of the lead unit.
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With the end of Daylight Savings Time the previous Sunday, the sun is now disappearing behind the mountains before 5pm. Shortly after sunset, a westbound coal empty crosses the grade crossing at 80th as it approaches a Diverging Approach (red over yellow) signal at East Leyden.
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I must admit that the Kansas City Southern "Retro-Belle" paint scheme is one of my favorite paint schemes among railroads today. With the nearest KCS tracks being in Kansas City, it is not too often that one shows up in Denver. It is even less common when one leads a train west on the Moffat, such as on this day.
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If UP ever decided to sell the Moffat at some point in the future, imagine the interesting scenario in which Kansas City Southern is somehow the railroad to buy it! If that were to somehow happen, then sights like this one would actually be common place. That has not happened, of course, and in this shot we see a KCS SD70ACe being power shared on the point of a westbound UP coal empty.
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This coal train actually loaded in Utah at the Savage mine rather than in Colorado. It is making its way back east and, due to the long distance, will have to stop in Denver for a full (FRA-required) inspection. The symbol of the train is the CSVJA9-28. The "9" at the end of the symbol (before the date) indicates the train requires a 1,500-mile inspection.
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The lazy days of summer are definitely behind us on Halloween Eve as an eastbound coal load heads out of Rocky amidst a snowy Colorado storm. The train will enter in to Yard Track 1 at North Yard so a full inspection can take place as the train has to travel over 1,500 miles.
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A Kansas City Southern SD70ACe add a little color to the Moffat as it leads a westbound coal empty west from Leyden. While the high temperature the previous day was 78°F, today the high barely reached 40°F as a wintery cold front moved in to the area.
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