BNSF/UP Chillicothe Sub Action, UP Coal Empties, BNSF X-SMRPEI and X-HERPEI - 4-2-23

After church, I returned to Princeville to check progress on track re-arrangement, and caught quite a bit of action. Description below. The two hot UP intermodals which play this route daily must have met around Williamsfield...


CAPTION: Early-afternoon Sunday, April 2, 2023 was busy on BNSF Railway's Chillicothe Subdivision between Princeville and Chillicothe. I missed an eastbound BNSF vehicle train but managed to capture Union Pacific's Z-G4CI at Princeville. I then chased counterpart Z-CIG4 to Blue Ridge Road, just west of Chillicothe. It passed a westbound BNSF vehicle train at Edelstein. I headed back west only to encounter an eastbound BNSF intermodal train at Edelstein which cleared just in time to capture a second westbound BNSF vehicle train! 

(1) Z-G4CI - UP 7230, UP 2721, UP 5509 and UP 2596 have 120 platforms
(2) Z-CIG4 - UP 2731, UP 5061, UP 6579 and UP 6183 have 95 platforms, UP 5375 and UP 5640 as mid-train DPUs, and 91 more platforms.
(3) EB BNSF IM - BNSF 4240 and BNSF 4453 have 99 platforms.
(4) WB BNSF Vehicle Train - BNSF 4647 and BNSF 6312 have 73 cars.

I stuck around the Akron Elevator area waiting for an empty coal train that Union Pacific received from the CN at Grove (TZPR Pekin double main). 


CAPTION: A northbound Union Pacific train of coal empties, originating at Decatur, Illinois and received via the Tazewell & Peoria Railroad's Pekin double track, rolls by the Akron Services elevator at Akron, Illinois mid-afternoon Sunday, April 2, 2023. UP 7723, UP 6301 and UP 7106 have 136 cars.

Later, social media provided a heads up that two BNSF unit trains at Peoria, and approaching Peoria. An empty gluten feed pellet train was first, and I saw it enter TZPR territory at S. Darst Street. 


CAPTION: BNSF Railway train X-SMRPEI (Grain Empties, Summerfield TX to Peoria IL) crawls onto Tazewell & Peoria Railroad trackage at S. Darst Street in Peoria, Illinois late-afternoon Sunday, April 2, 2023. BNSF 4152, BNSF 6159 and BNSF 7247 have 100 gluten feed empties for interchange to Canadian National Railway, which will forward it to ADM's Wet Corn Plant in Decatur.

 

Knowing the second one, X-HERPEI, was due, I drove to W. Farmington Road and waited. The wait was short, and it raced by me! I expected it to slow before it reached my position, though it did shortly after passing. 


CAPTION: BNSF Railway train X-HERPEI (Grain Empties, Hereford TX to Peoria IL) rolls by W. Farmington Road near Peoria, Illinois late-afternoon Sunday, April 2, 2023. BNSF 7210, BNSF 8249 and BNSF 7199 have 116 grain empties for interchange to the TP&W.

- David P. Jordan
 

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