Just In Time...Intercepting Iowa Interstate's PESI 1-13-18



I got lucky. 

Late Saturday morning, an Iowa Interstate crew was called to take manifest PESI (Peoria IL to Silvis IL) out of the Tazewell & Peoria Railroad's East Peoria Yard. I worked from 6:00 am to noon, but hoped I could catch the train's departure. 

Moments later, I realized that it was mid-month, and I needed to pay some bills and do some banking. This being Saturday, the bank closes at 1:00pm so I had an hour to get home (just northwest of Peoria), crunch some numbers and transfer some dough. 

I left work today at noon, and things got tight. Moments after sitting in my car and switching on my Radio Shack scanner, I heard the TZPR dispatcher give Iowa Interstate 505 permission to depart the East Lead (East Peoria) for the North Limit Yard. 

I now had less than an hour to get home, gather the info I needed and make the transactions. I also needed some lunch. Somehow, I did all these things in plenty of time then headed down Rt. 6 in hopes of intercepting the Iowa Interstate train. 

Fortunately for me, trains are restricted to 10 mph on TZPR trackage from East Peoria to the North Limit Yard and for a few miles on the Iowa Interstate's Peoria Subdivision. An hour had passed since IAIS 505 received permission to depart so I wasn't surprised to see it immediately after making a right (southbound) onto Rt. 29. I quickly turned around, got ahead of the train and scouted locations that weren't backlit. That soon proved impossible so I settled on a favorite location between Chillicothe and Sparland. 

- David P. Jordan

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