Peoria Station

Morning airline operations at Peoria Int'l Airport on May 25, 2026 Evening airline operations at Peoria Int'l Airport on May 25, 2026 It is time for my annual update on local airline service.  As usual, I use the month of July for my annaul analysis. Barring last minute changes, the schedules and route map below are accurate. So let us delve into the present situation.  ALLEGIANT AIR Like last year, schedules for July 2026 show most flights operated with Airbus A320 equipment. They do not discern between 177-seat A320s or brand-new 186-seat A320SEOs. Smaller A319s, configured for 156 seats, are used on Las Vegas and Orlando-Sanford routes. Brand new Boeing 737 Max 8-200 aircraft began appearing on St. Petersburg/Clearwater nonstops as early as February 2025 and are also used on some of the Orlando-Sanford nonstops. These new Boeing planes are equipped with 190 seats.  Compared to July 2025, the airline is offering four fewer weekly departures. The most significant change ...

No Caterpillar loads on this Monday. The first 13 cars (maybe 14, but that car is empty) were from Friday's Keokuk Junction Railway delivery. Ten cars near the end are likely ADM corn germ/meal, etc. from the Iowa Interstate.  CAPTION: Norfolk Southern Railway train D49 (Local, Normal IL to E. Peoria turn) is shown on its return leg to Good Yard at Normal, Illinois mid-afternoon Monday, June 29, 2026. First scene is at N. Main Street in Morton's outskirts and then again at Deer Creek with a slow order. NS 3228, NS 7021 and NS 5116 (Des Moines unit via IAIS) have 45 cars. - David P. Jordan

After a family reunion in Indiana Sunday afternoon, I caught a TP&W local moving from Effner to near Gilman. The consist of 88 cars could have been entirely for Incobrasa Industries' Gilman plant complex (which opened a second soybean crushing facility last week, and was dedicated on June 22). This includes three methanol loads (UN 1230) near the end, but it is the TP&W, so I'll include it here.  CAPTION: A Toledo, Peoria & Western Railway local journeys westward from Effner to Gilman, Illinois late-afternoon and early-evening Sunday, June 28, 2026. The crew had earlier worked from Gilman to Effner with the first two units, adding TPW 5008 and flipping back with what appears to be a solid train for Incobrasa Industries. Scenes are at Sheldon, 2500 East Road, Watseka and Crescent City. MQT 3407, IORY 3492 and TPW 5008 have 88 cars. Monday morning's "M-Train" had 32 Incobrasa covered hoppers on the head end. It is possible that some are soybean meal l...

I went to the Decatur Train Fair today. Shortly after my arrival, I was able to capture Canadian National Railway's daily manifest leaving for Memphis, Tennessee. Even better, the consist include two or three cars (and maybe more) that came off L557 from East Peoria!    Car 23 - UTLX 63090 is an empty tank car, and last contained sodium hydroxide solution (UN 1824). It was pulled from PMP Fermentation Products in Peoria.    Car 24 - TZPR 321848 is a loaded gondola, containing scrap metal. It was pulled from Alter Metal Recycling, probably the Clarke Street facility (Alter also operates a yard for Liberty Steel & Wire).    Car 71 - CNA 415800 is an empty boxcar. I haven't seen boxcars at Amerhart Ltd's Pekin warehouse for awhile, so I'm thinking this car could have last contained zinc ingots. If so, it was pulled from Liberty Steel & Wire Co. at Bartonville. The zinc boxcars ten to be hi-cubes, however. (CN's Peoria and Gilman Subs, which co...

I worked until 5:00pm on Friday, but learned that a TP&W "M-Train" had left East Peoria maybe 30 minutes prior. So instead of going home first, I took off east and found the train between Eureka and Secor, able to beat it to the latter, though not by much (the slow order from earlier this year has been fixed). I got it again in El Paso.    I'm glad I had my camera in the car.    The two units on Friday's train are the newest power seen on the TP&W. Until earlier this year, the OHCR 3329 had been sitting at the Tazewell & Peoria Railroad's Creve Coeur diesel shop since 2024. BERX 6908 arrived in mid-May, and was quickly pressed into service. BERX is the reporting mark for Genesee & Wyoming Inc's Berkshire & Eastern Railroad, which is the neutral operator of the Pan Am Southern, a company jointly owned by CSX Transportation and Norfolk Southern Railway. Apparently, C40-8Ws make the BERX 6908, and SD40-2s, superfluous.    Friday's ea...

I saw a Facebook group message about this train just as I was leaving work at 5:00 this afternoon, so I decided to go for it. I caught it in Chillicothe, and was able to capture the first scene at the W. Moffitt Street crossing. I wanted another shot, so I settled on Sparland, which turned out very well! Notables include a loaded GBRX gondola (steel billets?) and three dry bulk fertilizer (urea, phosphate, etc.) loads (cars 22-24), possibly for the Growmark facility at Stuart, Iowa.  CAPTION: Iowa Interstate manifest PESI rolls by W. Moffitt in Chillicothe, Illinois late-afternoon Thursday, June 18, 2026. Shortly in early-evening, it was rolling through Sparland. IAIS 700 and IAIS 153 have NS 5281, and 43 cars. After capturing the IAIS train at Sparland, I crossed the river into Lacon and took Rt. 26 to East Peoria, hoping the CN local had not yet departed. I arrived with radio chatter indicating they were still in the TZPR yard. I sat at Wesley for a little while, but after dozin...