Why Do You Like to Railfan?

If you listen to the first part of this link, (after skipping the ad) that is my answer.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6913KnbMpHM

The bigger and faster the train is moving the better!

I have mentioned on this forum before that a life changing event for me was watching Milwaukee 261 pulling a 20 car consist of "classic passenger cars" up grade at 45 MPH.  That was the pinnacle of Rail Fanning for me in term of trains.

Although, like you, hanging out with other trains guys can be fun.  Wonder if that has something to do with being on this Forum?

@MainLine Steam posted:

If you listen to the first part of this link, (after skipping the ad) that is my answer.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6913KnbMpHM

The bigger and faster the train is moving the better!

I have mentioned on this forum before that a life changing event for me was watching Milwaukee 261 pulling a 20 car consist of "classic passenger cars" up grade at 45 MPH.  That was the pinnacle of Rail Fanning for me in term of trains.

Although, like you, hanging out with other trains guys can be fun.  Wonder if that has something to do with being on this Forum?

Too funny on the song. Never thought of it as a train song but that’s a perfect answer.

I've been fascinated by transportation machinery since I was a small child - trains, airplanes, automobiles, trucks, ships, boats. That interest hasn't changed over decades and it led me to become an engineer. Plus, when I see a railroad track, there is a curiosity to see what's around the bend, get on the train, and find out. The trains I watch (and ride) these days travel between places where I've lived my entire life, so I know the places, stations, cities and towns, from where they came and to where they're going.

I usually railfan from a station platform along a four-track electrified main line. Some trains speed through on the express tracks while others stop and passengers get on and off. I enjoy watching the speed and hearing the rumble of the fast ones and watching the conductors and passengers on the ones that stop.

Not least, watching trains provided the ideas for a how to build my model railroads.

MELGAR

My dad got me into "watching trains" in about 1944/1945. He would take me down to the yard office of the Jersey Central RR in Cranford, NJ. We would watch the big yard engines (0-8-0 steam locomotives) work. I got addicted to steam locomotives before I was 5. My mother did NOT want me to go to work for the railroad, as my dad and his dad had done. She forced me to go to college and "get a good job". Well, as luck would have it, the Electro-Motive Division of General Motors Corp. hired me right out of college, and I spent my entire working career in the railroad motive power industry. My love of steam locomotives also never wavered, and I spent as much time as I could working on AFT/SP 4449 and UP 844 and 3985.

I must admit that, after more than 78 years, I still enjoy driving over to the local Highlands Depot (Illinois) on the former CB&Q 3 track "East End" main line, and watching some of the trains. Between about 1:30 and 2PM, everyday, BNSF runs a huge intermodal train westbound, with 3 units up front and 2 more DPUs on the rear. Lots of power at speed (50 to 60MPH) makes the ground shake. Not steam, but pretty enjoyable, for my age now.

@Hot Water,

Jack,

I watched your interview by Rich Melvin last night. A very interesting discussion and career.

MELGAR

I agree with all of the points listed. It's a nice distraction from the daily grind. It was especially quite "therapeutic" during the pandemic when we were very limited on social activities. I like meeting up with some of the guys at our local station or I'll head out to a quiet back road in the country with a coffee, my scanner and my camera. I enjoy the hunt of getting heritage units and unique consists. Even with mixed feelings on tagging and graffiti, I find myself more and more looking at what's been painted on the rolling stock as they pass by.  My 1:1 hobby certainly influences my 1:48 hobby.

Rob

Most Forumites are from the eastern half of the country and it's interesting to see their answers to the topic question.

In the West, railroading is different.  It isn't too difficult to get to a location away from population where you can hear a train coming before you can see it, and, sometimes, you can see the train long before it gets to your location. Between trains, the aroma of creosote drifts up from the track, and the ties creak as the rail adjusts to the temperature. There's some undulating territory where trains operate at middle speeds, and a lot of territory where the locomotives are wide open, making from 15 to 50 MPH on long ascending grades, or flying past on 70 MPH freight trains, including coal trains and double stack trains almost 3 miles long.  

Like Hot Water pointed out, it's a sensory experience -- the noise, the aroma, the ground shaking and the dust flying.  I'm old enough to have enjoyed first generation EMD's in heavy grade territory on Santa Fe and Southern Pacific, and the whine of the cooling fans and the roots blowers -- along with what David Morgan called the chant of the EMD 2-cycle engines -- first becoming audible down the canyon, then getting louder and louder, reaching a crescendo when the engines passed, and then the chant gradually fading into the distance for several more minutes . . . well, it was stirring, to say the least, and those memories are very fond ones which keep me coming back to trackside.

And then there were the San Diegans, departing westward out of Fullerton with two Alcos that eased the train into motion and then wound up into a raspy shout while billowing black exhaust as the train accelerated.  Or No. 23, the Grand Canyon, 16 mixed lightweight and heavyweight cars accelerating behind warbonnet F7's with a cab unit on each end and two or three booster units in between.  And I can't forget the fragrant aroma that the dining car exuded as it passed.  When I watch a modern passenger train come and go at a station, I recall how my own days as a passenger Engineer were influenced by those past memories.

There is just something about the railroad that is in my soul and being at trackside satisfies and allows me to put daily life on the back burner for a little while. That's why I still railfan after 75 years of watching trains and 36 years of working for the railroad.

Most or even all of my railfanning has been by happenstance, while on a job, a train comes by, or back in the day stuck at a RR crossing; and taking the local into Philly from the north end and as a youngster taking the suburban trains into Philly from the west end during school years. The only serious railfanning has been by reading RR books and magazines. Nonetheless, and I think this holds true for any model railroader, our desire to railfan is partly accomplished in the scenes we build on our layouts for trains to run through. For me, it's urban scenery that I find most interesting. It is purely fascinating to model the built-environment...part of this allure is a mystery to me.

@Number 90 posted:

Most Forumites are from the eastern half of the country and it's interesting to see their answers to the topic question.

In the West, railroading is different.  It isn't too difficult to get to a location away from population where you can hear a train coming before you can see it, and, sometimes, you can see the train long before it gets to your location.

I recently experienced the long-distance sensory alert while out in Arizona visiting my in-laws. Using a pair of binoculars from a high point in a rural nature park I could see a ribbon of intermodals winding their way east from a Tucson suburb through a desert canyon miles away. The sound of the engines ever so feint, gradually picked up to a full roar when the train passed beneath me at an overpass. From initial sighting to the engine passing took a good 20-30 minutes. Fantastic experience.