Day 1 - Sunday, May 29, 2016
Milwaukee–Chicago–Poplar Bluff, Mo.

Photos by Dave Ingles

The first photos are actually from Sat., May 28, when I went into Milwaukee to record the consist that I expected to comprise Otto Dobnick's and my Hiawatha #334 the next day, based on normal cycling. This turned out to be accurate. This is train #335 crossing the Menominee River just east of Milwaukee's Amtrak station. Our trip the next day was routine and on-time, and we met many fellow Explorers gathering in Chicago Union Station's Metro Lounge for first-class passengers (this includes any private-car patrons, a nice touch by Amtrak). The "NPCU" (non-powered cab unit, AKA cabbage car, control cab, et al), 90200, of course led our #334 to Chicago; it was the first-ever F40PH built, in the mid 1970s, as Amtrak 200.

After one false start to load the "Eagle," once back in the lounge, we heard the "Empire Builder" consist rumble by, to position for loading on Track 19 (a thru track with Track 28 on the south side). It's departure time is 2:15, and ours was to be 1:45, but the train was delayed in the yard over some indecision, regarding a refrigeration unit problem, on whether or not to leave the Sightseer Lounge car behind, or not; ultimately, it went along with us, but without refrigerated products able to be served. This photo looks north at the "Builder's" consist, and the next photo is of one of the frequent tour boats on the Chicago River south branch adjacent to Union Station. I grabbed a chair on Caritas' rear platform to shoot the sights as we left Chicago for Joliet on the former GM&O.

We finally left at 3:10 pm, 1 hour 25 minutes late. I made good use of the sunny day in shooting things as we passed Amtrak's yard. in the first shot, that is the just-arrived California Zephyr to the left.

Amtrak 592 is a gen-set locomotive, first time I'd seen one of Amtrak's.

Next is the view north at the Lumber St. grade crossing, with the 18th St. bridge prominent and the Willis Tower (still "Sears Tower" to many of us) standing tall. We crossed the South Branch bridge and curved around at 21st St. interlocking to gain CN (former ICG) trackage. That's CTA's Orange Line to Midway Airport on the viaduct, and we soon passed an inbound L train, between Bridgeport (where CN's ex-IC Iowa Division and formerly the Santa Fe both diverged) and Brighton Park (where the L swings south away from us).

This pair of units was drilling the north end of BNSF's ex-Santa Fe Corwith Yard, now an intermodal facility.

Just to the west, the image is not super-sharp but we look north on the Belt Railway of Chicago where a southbound CSX-led train awaits our passage. The single track crossing visible is the former Santa Fe main out of Corwith Yard, as far east as it now goes. Our crossing of BRC is LeMoyne, Santa Fe's is called Nerska.

At the west end of Glenn Yard, the ex-GM&O facility, I spotted my first repainted EJ&E SD38-2, 664, teamed with still J-orange 657 on what looked to be a drag ready to leave west.

As we passed the huge Corn Products plant in Argo, just south of the IHB crossing, I was ready for a rare view of their switchers, and this is the best view of 3 I snapped working. They are, alas, leasers now, formerly lettered for Corn Products and painted in a BRC-like black, yellow, and gray scheme (probably done at BRC's Clearing shop).

Lemont and Lockport are reputedly the oldest railroad stations in Illinois (the Midwest?) still serving passengers continuously (Metra Heritage Corridor commuters), both made from native Joliet-area stone, the same material as used in the old Stateville Prison, a watch tower of which is in the third photo. The control-point crossovers' name: Stateville! Watch for Joliet Jake and Elwood Blues as you pass.

We pulled in to what passes for the Joliet station stop at 4:11 and left 5 minutes later, now down 1:36. Amtrak has a platform, with no elevator, on the east side, and Metra Rock Island has a new long platform north of its track east of the crossing, but for railfans as well as passengers, Joliet has gone "ETTS." The old depot is now a city-owned rental hall (Amtrak may still have an office downstairs in it?), but UD tower is closed and the place is just not very railfan-friendly anymore, although an unknown photographer got the accompanying good shot of our train passing UD Tower, send around by John Arbuckle who swiped it off the Internet. The stone building seen close-up is part of the Joliet Fire Dept. HQ, but look at the bay window on the west (left) side -- once upon a time, this was EJ&E's stub-end passenger depot, for what little service it offered! To the east of the Amtrak platform is the Silver Cross Field, the Joliet minor league baseball park. After Joliet I went inside, and eventually to dinner as we neared Springfield.

As we neared Springfield, I went to a Dutch door for photos and hopefully to see long-time friend Dick Wallin, who planned to photograph us north of the depot, a spot near Carpenter St. that still was in good low sunlight even tho we were running about an hour and a half late. Alas, he woke up from a "double nap" just in time to get to trainside when were IN the depot, an area full of shadows. The first photo is as we curved alongside what little is left of the old GM&O Ridgely Yard in Springfield, with the former Chicago & Illinois Midland from Peoria coming in at the right. Ridgely Tower was the last "armstrong" (manual) interlocking plant in use in the country, lasting until 2011. The building was too rickety to be moved, so it was razed.

A mile or so south of Ridgely, I snapped this view looking east on Converse St. The 3-story building on the right (third in from the tracks), at the corner of 9th St., was where I lived during my Springfield years, 1967-1971, in a studio apartment on the first floor.

This area north of the depot is where I expected to see Mr. Wallin. The depot platform area has been spruced up in recent years. We were in the depot 6:43–6:54, departing 1:28 late. This depot dates to Alton Railroad days, and while with the upcoming "higher speed" trains on this line, there is talk of re-routing the Amtrak line on the NS right of way thru the eastern edge of downtown, but talk is cheap, The Alton-GM&O once was double track thru the city, but there is much mid-street running on 3rd St. south of the station, one example pictured. Meantime, UP has a nice newly rebuilt railroad, the state of Illinois is broke, and its political gridlock makes the U.S. Congress and President's relationship look warm. I expect the use of this depot to outlast me.

I took one more "side shot," as we curved to join NS's Decatur-K.C. main line at where the old Iles Tower guarded a diamond, then later, near Carlinville — a flag stop we highballed through at 7:35 — a Prairie State sunset from the Great Dome.

Since the "Eagle" would return to the Illinois side of the Mississippi River to detour from St. Louis to Poplar Bluff, we crossed the river from Madison, Ill., into St. Louis on the Merchants Bridge, always a dispatcher option but used infrequently. For us, it was expedient to do this, so I snapped the last rays of light in the west, looking upriver, from mid-bridge at 8:35 p.m. Had we taken MacArthur bridge as normal, this shot might've shown the Gateway Arch at last light. Once beneath the Arch, on TRRA's "new high line" (which replaced riverbank street running years ago), we went straight south thru the elevated Lesperance Wye and then backed up the almost-a-mile into the Amtrak depot, arriving at 9:18. By the time we left, at 10:05, 2 hours 5 minutes late, I was in my roomette bed with the window shade up. We proceeded straight to the MacArthur Bridge as Chicago-bound trains usually do, but then veered right down to Valley Junction to get on UP's Chester Sub, the former MoPac-Cotton Belt jointly used double-track main line to and across the Thebes Bridge into MIssouri once again. After 28-minute delay by UP's Dupo Yard just south of St. Louis while crews tried to rectify an alleged problem with the "FRED" on Caritas (consensus became that the problem was with the receiver in Amtrak engine 57), we passed Chester at 12:23 a.m., so this series will continue in the "Day 2" file.

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