Has anyone seen this train?
A friend sent this tonight written by David Carter who rode this beautiful train last week. Here are his comments:
Iowa Pacific Holding is a company in Chicago that has bought small short line railroads in ten different states, including the Grenada Railroad that operates on part of the old IC line between Memphis and Jackson. Apparently their CEO likes the IC, for they are painting their engines in the IC passenger colors of brown and orange, complete with the ‘Green Diamond”.
This run from Batesville to Grenada and return was sponsored by the Iowa Pacific and the Memphis chapter of the National Railway Historical Society, and was not highly publicized. I found out about it from a friend in Tupelo. It was pulled by a pair of E8’s with ten matching brown and orange passenger cars. It was called “City of Grenada”, and I think they plan to make it an annual event. They run a Christmas train called the ”Polar Express”, and also announced plans to run dinner train(s) in the summer, hopefully from Memphis to Grenada.
