Jon Searles' photos with the keyword: Pennsylvania

This is my latest, and maybe last, photo of a locomotive still in Conrail colors pulling a regular freight train. This is in PRR (in the sense of Norfolk Southern, I don't know historically speaking) territory near (or in) Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. Because I took this from a car it's slightly blurred and so I can't get the number, but I think that this locomotive is a GP38, as it has two radiator fans, and Conrail had few GP38-2's, and no SD38's (which would have longer frames anyway).

This concrete viaduct is in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, and carries a railroad line over the Susquehanna River. Incidentally, this isn't the famous Rockville Bridge where an accident occurred (containers blown off a freight train in a blizzard) the day after I took this. That bridge is considerably north of this one, and stone, in addition to having three fewer arches. It probably isn't visible in this photo. Therefore, this would be the Philadelphia & Reading bridge, built in 1924 named for the railroad that built it, which became the Reading Company later that year, being merged into Conrail in 1976, passing to Norfolk Southern in the Conrail breakup of 1997, meaning that Norfolk Southern are the current operators. Visible behind this bridge in the water are the ruins of some piers from the South Pennsylvania Railroad Bridge, started, but never completed, in 1884.

This is a considerable edit and crop of a larger shot out the window of a car. I'm considering a re-edit, as well, since this shot appears to have too much contrast to be realistic. As far as I know, this is Wilkes Barre, Pennsylvania.

Here's the station building in Harrisburg. I don't know the date of construction, but it's obviously from the 1920s or 1930s, and built by the Pennsylvania Railroad. It now hosts primarily Amtrak passenger services.

Here's a shot of Amtrak #166 (on the left), which is a G.E. Genesis P42 diesel, and an unidentified AEM7 (on the right), coupled to some Amfleet cars at Harrisburg. The sign in the foreground is, of course, the station sign, sporting the post-1999 Amtrak logo.

I didn't do too much train watching on my most recent trip to the U.S., but I did manage to snap some pictures in Harrisburg on my way through. These material handling cars are used by Amtrak for mail and parcels, and are coupled to Amtrak's regular trains. Basically converted boxcars his makes them the fastest boxcars, and the fastest non-passenger cars, in the U.S., as some operate (in mail service) as fast as 110 m.p.h.

I took this as we were approaching Scranton, and met an NYS&W excursion leaving Scranton. The same train had taken NRHS members from the Central New York and Utica & Mohawk Valley Chapters to Scranton for the weekend, although the convention, as usual was week-long. Months later, the engineer in #2400 (who I knew) commented that he had seen me taking the picture, and couldn't fully believe that it was me, as he thought I was on his train.

I haven't marked the loco under "locomotives" on this one, simply because it isn't actually visible. This is really more about the train departing into the sunset. :-)

This is Picture 4 of my series on Amtrak #910 at Lancaster.

Although I've forgotten the exact date (it was the day they unveiled the Lancaster station sign, I know that much), I do remember taking my photos of 910 late in the day, and in this shot you get to see some of the sunset.

This was a better shot that I got of AMTK 910 after it pulled into Lancaster.

This was my first-ever real-life look at an Amtrak AEM7, and oddly it wasn't on the Northeast Corridor, but on the Keystone Corridor at Lancaster, PA while at the 1995 NRHS National Convention.

This was where we picked up our Reading & Northern excursion train at the NRHS National Convention, led by a matching set of Reading EMD FP7s that had just been restored. Here's the newer of the two, number 903.

As our excursion pulled in, I got this lucky shot of 902 and 2398 lined up just right for this shot, which I quite like.

Here, back in order, this was where we picked up our Reading & Northern excursion train at the NRHS National Convention, led by a matching set of Reading EMD FP7s that had just been restored. Here's a shot of our train pulling in, headed by the FP7s, with a Reading and Northern freight on the adjacent track.

Slight out of order here....:-(, this was where we picked up our Reading & Northern excursion train at the NRHS National Convention, led by a matching set of Reading EMD FP7s that had just been restored. Here's the older of the two, number 902.

Unfortunately this shot failed to capture 2398's cab, but it does give one of the better views that I got of 3300 during the NRHS Convention, as it wasn't there for show and had to hurry on its way without being uncoupled for us to get a better look.

Here's a closer and more detailed shot of R&N 2398.