Real Rail Fan by Philadelphia Tracks

A Pennsylvania Railroad GG-1 Electric Locomotive 

I met Tom as he stood beside the tracks that run north-south through Philadelphia along the west bank of the Schuylkill River. His place to watch trains is where the freight tracks run along a roadbed 20 feet above the river and 30 feet below the Schuylkill Expressway.  He stands at a spot close to the Philadelphia city line near his childhood home in Manayunk. Trees line both sides of the tracks rising up to the expressway on the east side and making a wooded border between the tracks and the sheltered picnic area below the tracks close to the river.

Tom is a lifelong railfan. He was born within sight of a bridge in Manayunk where the freight tracks cross a creek.  He knows now that a house within sight of a busy freight tracks means he grew up poor, but at the time he thought himself incredibly lucky. Day or night year-round he saw long freight trains roar as the accelerated from the city and heard the clash of couplers as long trains slowed going into the city. 

While we talked a long train passed with many cars painted bright green or blue. A few were red or orange. They had no logos and looked like an odd cross between sea-going containers and freight cars.  Tom told me we were looking at a trash train.  Since it was going north it was empty. Unit trains of eighty cars roll out of New York City filled with demolition waste from construction and regular trash also.  The trains go south to rural areas in poor inland southern states willing to “bury the trash for New York cash.”

A container train went past with long-slung flat cars holding double-stacked forty-foot containers from ships. I said something about these container trains being the highest priority trains. Tom quickly corrected me. “The highest priority trains are the two UPS trailer trains every day. One goes New York and one to Atlanta each day.  Everything else moves to a siding when they go through.”

We talked about Philadelphia being a rail town and great place to watch trains. Four miles south of where we were talking freight tracks pass through the city on a long trestle thirty feet above Drexel University. The double-track steel structure supports trains with nearly one hundred cars and four engines.  These mile-long trains can weigh more than twenty million pounds.  When the trains pass over Market Street, they are above 30^th Street Station. Just below the freight trestle, SEPTA trains go into and out of the station on six tracks on the second floor of the north side of the huge station building. 

Below street level, Amtrak passenger trains going to New York and points north, Washington DC and south, Harrisburg and the west, roll in and out of the station on ten tracks.  Even below that are the Market Street El and trolleys to the west side of the city.  Four levels of trains above and below the main street of the city and even below the river. 

Tom grew up watching the trains from his window and riding into the city on a banana-seat bicycle seeing SEPTA and Amtrak trains along with the El and the trolleys as they changed over the years.  His main interest is freight trains. Steam engines were taken out of service on the Pennsylvania Railroad in 1957, a few years before Tom was born, but he saw electric freight engines when he was young. 

As mist started to gather on the cool afternoon as we spoke, we saw a unit train of crude oil tankers go past. He talked about how new and well designed the cars are. He would prefer that crude moved in pipelines, but thinks rail is vastly better and safer than trucks. Tom remembers when long trains of coal hoppers moved up and down these tracks daily.  He works at a small chemical plant making road repair products, sealers and tar.  “I’m in my late 50s. I’ll retire in a few years. They can’t find young people to replace us. It’s tough work.”  When he does retire, Tom plans to stay in the Philadelphia area.

Tom stands by the tracks that were built by the Pennsylvania Railroad. The same tracks were part of Conrail at the end of the 20^th Century and are now owned by CSX.  He takes pictures and videos of the trains as they pass. He said he has been chased away from trackside by the CSX security guards. But they don’t bother him very often. He brings lunch, an umbrella and a camp chair and watches the Saturday trains go by.

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