Fall-Foliage attempt

Westbound 23M through autumn splendor. (Photo by Jack Hughes.)

My brother and I went to Altoona (PA) two weekends ago, hopefully to get fall foliage pictures chasing trains.
We both are railfans, me since age-2. My brother is 13 years younger than me. I’m 71 and he’s 58.
The railroad is Norfolk Southern over Allegheny Mountain, the old Pennsylvania Railroad main.
Pennsy no longer exists. It merged with New York Central in 1968, and Penn-Central went bankrupt in two years, the largest corporate bankruptcy at that time.
Both Pennsy and New York Central had been busy conduits of railroad traffic to and from the east-coast megalopolis. Other railroads served that area too, and all also failed.
So when Penn-Central failed, northeast railroading became a mess. The government stepped in and engineered a fix, Conrail, and both the Pennsy and NYC mains became Conrail.
Norfolk Southern is a 1982 merger of Norfolk & Western and Southern Railway. Conrail became successful and privatized. It became interested in selling.
CSX was gonna buy all of it, but Norfolk Southern wanted part. Finally a deal was struck, so Conrail broke up and sold in 1999.
CSX got the old New York Central main across NY, and Norfolk Southern got the old Pennsy main across PA.
Norfolk Southern was successful in selling its railroad service, so the old Pennsy main is still very busy.
The Allegheny Crossing area is very interesting to a railfan like me, with multiple trains letting it all hang out, wide-open climbing, and trying to prevent runaways descending.
There are other places with greater train frequency, but not operating at extremes.
Most of the area is forested with deciduous trees, so turns orange during October.
I publish an annual calendar of our train-pictures, so need photos specific for each month. That is, snow for January, February, December, and maybe March, bare trees for April, November, and maybe even May, Fall-color for October, and greenery the other months.
I should explain chasing trains, since people ask.
My brother and I both have railroad-radio scanners. As a train passes a signal the engineer must call out the signal-aspect: “clear,” “approach” (slow, prepared to stop), or “restricting” (stop). The engineer will say what track he’s on, his train-number, direction, and signal-location — “UN, 21E, west on Two, clear!” (“UN” being the signal location, “21E” the train-number.)
Often the train-engineers are female.
Since I know where the signals are, we’ll know if that train is coming, or if we can beat it to another location.
The railroad also has lineside defect-detectors that broadcast on the railroad-radio. “Norfolk Southern milepost 253.1, Track One, no defects.”
The defect-detectors serve the purpose caboose trainmen once served, to look for train defects: hot wheels, dragging equipment, etc.
Track One is eastbound, and I know where milepost 253.1 is. So that radio broadcast tells me if I’ll see the train, or if I should move.
So we ram all over the area “chasing trains.” The railroad is still quite busy, maybe even busier than years ago. The idea is to photograph the train at a scenic location, grist for my train-calendar.
Trains are frequent; we don’t have to wait long. Although there may be slow times, or trackwork closing a track or two.
There also is a schedule of freight-trains running every day. Plus the railroad runs extra trains, like coal or crude-oil.
We may photograph 20 or more trains while the sun is up. One time we got 30.
Although that was with my railfan friend from Altoona, Phil Faudi (“FOW-dee;” as in “wow”).
I began chasing trains with Phil years ago, while my wife was still alive. He was doing it as a business.
Then he quit the business. He had been doing the driving, and had too many near-accidents.
Then he began helping me chase trains: me driving and he riding shotgun monitoring his railroad-radio scanner to tell me where to go.
Then his wife, who has Multiple Sclerosis, became a worry. He was afraid of her falling without him around if we were out chasing trains.
So now he stays home, but monitoring his railroad scanner, and calls my cellphone while I’m out chasing trains.
This works pretty good, although he can only monitor Altoona and the east slope of The Hill. A bed-and-breakfast for railfans broadcasts the west slope railroad-radio feed on the Internet, and we can get that on our Smartphones.
“Fifty miles of railroad,” my brother will say. In Altoona that’s our scanners, plus our Smartphones getting the west slope Internet feed from the bed-and-breakfast.
We don’t do as well as with Phil, who used to do sudden U-turns to beat a train to a location.
But we do okay. The line is busy enough we don’t have to wait long.
A train might appear and we shoot, then we wait for the engineer to call out a signal so we can identify the train.
With Phil the signal-callout came first, and he might suddenly U-turn to beat that train to a photo-location.
As is commonly the case, my brother drove to Altoona Wednesday, October 21st to chase trains alone Thursday, October 22nd while I drove down.
For him the trip is nine hours; for me it’s five. He’s coming from the Boston area; me from the Rochester (NY) area.
Thursday was cloudy, but he did okay.
Fall foliage was debatable. Phil said it peaked a week earlier, but there was still plenty of orange around.
Up on Tunnel Hill overlook, atop Allegheny Mountain, I have seen total orange over the valley.
But it was still fairly green.


22W east at Brickyard Crossing. (Photo by Jack Hughes.)


26T East from Eighth Street overpass in Altoona. (Photo by Jack Hughes.)


36A, all auto-racks, eastbound at Lower Riggles Gap Road overpass in Pinecroft. (Photo by Jack Hughes.)


67X west, an empty crude-oil train, led by only the barcode-engine, #1111, approaches the Lower Riggles Gap Road overpass. (Photo by Jack Hughes.)


16A east on Track One approaches the Route 53 overpass. (Photo by Jack Hughes.)


35A west on Four approaches the Route 53 overpass. (The two lead locomotives are recent shop overhauls; added in Altoona. That lead unit is not a wide-cab.) (Photo by Jack Hughes.)

My brother shot various locations, Brickyard and Eighth street bridge.
When I arrived he was at Pinecroft, where Lower Riggles Gap Road crosses the tracks on an overpass.
I usually avoid Pinecroft, because the tracks are straight both coming and going. Long straights; I think curves are more photogenic.
But he got the barcode engine, #1111. Look at the locomotive number-board and you’ll see the railroad has accommodated the railfans.
The number is tiny; a barcode.
Norfolk Southern does this — it doesn’t discourage fans. Other railroads might hate having railfans around; they can be unsafe.
Norfolk Southern painted 20 new locomotives in colors of predecessor railroads.
Railfans go crazy following them around. Websites detail the locations of these 20 locomotives, the so-called “Heritage Units.”
The locomotives are used as regular power, so if a train shows up with a Heritage-Unit, there’s usually a railfan contingent.
My brother’s oil-refinery security-detail wonders why so many photographers line the tracks into his refinery. A Heritage-Unit is leading a crude-oil train.
The railfans are even using drones over the refinery’s unloading facility. They get perceived as a terrorist threat.
About the only way to deal with this is for the FBI and the NSA to show up — and bust heads. Take cameras, drones, etc.
Do that and you ruin the railfan experience. Faudi used to always advise playing it safe; no trespassing, and stay off the tracks.
Drone footage was on You-Tube, but that was looking over a derailment in Altoona.
I never knew of the barcode-unit, but it makes sense. And apparently the railroad has played along by installing a non-stock number-board.
Our chase continued Friday; now it was me and him.
We also hit various locations. Alto Tower off 17th Street bridge, the Route 53 bridge over five-tracks, also Pinecroft and Portage.


Train 36A again passes Alto Tower (closed) in Altoona. (Photo by Jack Hughes.)


27N off the 1898 bypass into Portage. (Photo by BobbaLew.)


I3M, bare-tables for double-stacks, passes through Portage (PA). This train originally had another number (23Q), but changed numbers when recrewed in Altoona. (Photo by Jack Hughes.)


12G eastbound on One through Portage. (Photo by Jack Hughes.)


21E, the westbound UPS train, into South Fork. (Photo by BobbaLew.)


67Z westbound, an empty crude-oil train, from the Tunnel-Hill overlook. (Photo by Jack Hughes.)

The sun was out; it was perfect weather, not a cloud in the sky.
But the sun moved quickly; by 4 p.m. we were getting heavy shadows in our pictures as the sun dropped low.
We also went up to Tunnel-Hill overlook near Gallitzin (“guh-LIT-zin;” as in “get”) in hopes the valley below would be ablaze in color.
It wasn’t. And in Winter the railroad is visible across the valley. It wasn’t. It was still blocked by trees.
Finally we tried a location totally new, where the tracks railroad-west of the Route 53 overpass turn toward Cresson (“KRESS-in”).
There the sunlight was perfect, and the trackside foliage was spectacular.
That’s my lede picture, my October calendar-shot.

The October Norfolk Southern Employees’ Photography-Contest calendar picture. (Photo by Don Woods.)

The night before we tried to find the location of the Norfolk Southern Employees’ Photography-Contest calendar October picture railroad-west of Cassandra (“Ka-SANN-druh;” as in the name “Anne”) on the 1898 bypass.
We couldn’t find it, and guessed the photographer being Norfolk Southern management got to the location on a company rail-rider truck.
But I think our shot is better; the color more strident.
Plus all is in sunlight; the contest picture looks like high clouds.
My brother took one final picture, Saturday morning before he drove home.


27N, west on Three, through Altoona. (Photo by Jack Hughes.)

I wonder how long I’m gonna be able to keep doing this. I’m 71, and somewhat unsteady on my feet.
But I can’t stop. Chasing trains is a joy!
I also learned I hafta mount my camera on a tripod, even the small lens.
Only my tripod-shots weren’t blurred.

• My beloved wife of over 44 years died of cancer April 17th, 2012. I miss her dearly.