There is a exit near Quinton siding on Oregon Interstate 84 that is a nice spot for a hit and run photo of a train running on Union Pacific. At 122 miles from downtown Portland, it was a great place to wait for a westbound to chase home after a day spent railfanning in the Columbia River Gorge. Since the exit was for Phillipi Canyon Road, we gave the site the generic name of "Phillipi."

Late on the Sunday afternoon of Labor Day Weekend 1990, we caught a westman at Phillipi with an interesting set of motive power. This was one of the only decent shots I ever got of a UP C30-7 leading a train. At the time, it was moderately amazing to get four different locomotive models on a UP train.

Tags:   Union Pacific UP Locomotive Train Railroad Railway General Electric GE C30-7 Columbia River Columbia River Gorge Oregon I-84 Freight Train EMD

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Back in the day, I used to joke with railfans that the area around Southern Pacific's Siskiyou Line should be called "Siskiyoulineland." Basically unchanged since it was built in the 1880s, the Siskiyou was a railfan Disneyland.

This scan of an MEWCM snaking across the Shasta Valley in April 1987 is a good case in point. It illustrates both the 19th-Century 'no frills' engineering of the Siskiyou and the awesome scenery. The Cotton Belt caboose was just a bonus.

Trains still run here today. However, a couple of Genesee & Wyoming GP38s with a dozen or so freight cars just isn't the same.

Tags:   Gazelle California caboose Southern Pacific SP Siskiyou County Siskiyou Line Siskiyou lumber Timber Industry lumber drag Trains Railroads Shasta Cascade Wonderland Mount Shasta SP Oregon Division SP Siskiyou Line Northern California North State Shasta Valley

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An inbound Weyerhaeuser Woods Railroad train is between Green Mountain and Headquartrers, Washington on a cloudy spring morning in 1991. The train hauled rough cut lumber and woodchips into the big Weyco mill in Longview. The lumber and chips originated at Weyco's small mill at Green Mountain.

When the train returned, it had chip and lumber empties for the Green Mountain facility, along with - log loads! At the time, Weyco was set up solely for truck logging. All of the logs from Weyco’s timberlands were trucked into the massive Longview plant. Logs that would be rough cut or chipped at Green Mountain were hauled out by train. Yes, the trains really carried logs from the mill TO the forest.

As is usual for a fair amount of my slide collection these days, this trackage is now abandoned. ETTS.

Tags:   Weyerhaeuser Weyco Weyerhaeuser Woods Railroad EMD SW-9 Freight Train Trains Timber Industry Railroads Washington

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Returning to Portland from Bend, a Union Pacific excursion train rolls through the Deschutes River Canyon near Sherar, Oregon. Thanks to the confluence of the White River, this is the only spot in the Deschutes River Canyon where you can get a train photograph with the peak of Mount Hood in the distance.

Tags:   Union Pacific UP UP 949 E unit EMD E9 Excursion Train Passenger Train Railroads Trains dome car Deschutes River Canyon Deschutes River Oregon BNSF BNSF Oregon Trunk Subdivision

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A westbound extra passes Redwood Junction Tower between San Jose and San Francisco.

Photo: John E. Shaw, Jr.

Tags:   Southern Pacific SP Freight Train F unit SF Bay Area Black widow California Trains Locomotive F7 EMD Intermodal Railroads tower Kodachrome

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