Railroaders' Nostalgia > Longest Crew Runs

In the Nostalgia forum, I posted a comment on SP's Passenger Trains operating between Ogden and Sparks.  The Train Crews ran all the way to Sparks.  This got me to wondering what was the longest regular Passenger run in the country, and longest Freight Crew district?

For me personally, I worked the for-mentioned Ogden - Sparks Passenger run which was  537 miles [as I remember]. *
I was cut off in 1981 and worked Tucumcari - El Paso freight.  If we went all the way to the Alfalfa Yard we ran 340 miles.  

Anyone have anything longer?

Pat

*[Talk about a B_ _ _ Buster for the flagman to stay awake, 101 and under Amtrak, 5 departed Ogden late in the evening and only made, what 3 or 4 station stops across some of the least populated part of the country in the dark.  Miles and miles without a single light to be seen.  Factor in a comfy seat, the swaying of the car and a background noise of snoring passengers, brutal.]

 

Back when Flagman were expected to be at the rear of the train and on the ground with flagging equipment in hand any time the train stopped rain or shine?  Properly dressed with coat and hat on too. 

I was lucky working the rear end with the old heads of yesteryear.   The Starlight's sleepers on the rear, "Daylight" time frame so it was actually a pleasant ride.  Every coach I deadheaded in at night always had that passenger with sleep apnea:) 

Never worked train service Oakland to Klamath Falls roughly 420 overnight miles.   Oakland to Dunsmuir on the Engine was hard enough after a sleepless daytime layover in the dreaded Jack London Inn.  

Sphogger

You should be a millionaire for how much money you made on that run.. 10 days pay for 2 1/2 calendar days

Please explain how you could run across two seniority districts?... Sparks Board and Ogden Board. 

El Paso to Tucumcari was one crew district after they cut out Carrizozo



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 08/04/16 06:07 by WAF.

What about Vaughn? Amtraks run Needles, CA to Albuquerque, NM was so long they eventually moved it seventy miles east to Kingman, AZ. I was very surprised when Santa Fe eliminated Ash Fork, AZ from the Winslow to Phoenix, AZ route. At 310 miles doesn't sound that long until you take into consideration  that more than two hundred miles of it is dark TWC territory with ALOT of that being in the twenty to thirty mph range.
JB 

The longest I worked was Oakland to Klamath Falls as an Amtrak Fireman,420 miles.One trip I made was with Bill Tatum ,who I think they called Iron Man for his ability to stay awake and very alert  on this all night trip.Seems like every trip was close to 12 hours if I recall correctly.Bill Webb



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 08/05/16 07:54 by spider1319.

WAF, passenger crew assignments frequently spanned two freight districts: out of Los Angeles passenger crews worked LA - Yuma, freight runs were LA - Indio, and Indio - Yuma.  Up the Coast, passenger; LA - San Louis Obispo, freights LA - Santa Barbara, Santa Barb - SLO.  San Joaquin, passenger; LA, Fresno, freight worked LA - Bakersfield,  Bakersfield - Fresno.
Common to off set the overlap into another sciennie's protected territory, every other run would be owned by the other district's crews.

Pat



 

"Running across seiority districts":

Seniority districts have been somewhat fluid over the decades, although they became mostly what we know today after WWII (at least until the wave of mega-mergers of the last 20 years). There is also a bit of disparity between "Division", as shown in an ETT, and "Division" in the sense of "seniority district". A Division is an administrative unit of the Company and is subject to change on a whim (and woe to the officials and exempt employees on that Division when they become adversely affected by a merger with another Division).

A "seniority district", on the other hand, is a union agreement thing, and it's limits can be changed only upon agreement between both parties (the Company and the Union). Originally, the limits of seniority districts and Divisions were the same, but over they years Companies played musical chairs with their Divisions, and this sameness receded. Thus, even though the SP's Coast Division was merged into the Western in the early 1960s, the Coast seniority district survived, right up until several years after the UP takeover.

The concept of crossing seniority districts dates a long way back in Union agreements. In it's most basic sense, if an engineer runs a train x number of miles off his district into another, then an engineer frrom that other district becomes eligible to operate a train the same number of miles on the first district. This is still true today with the Amtrak-BLE agreement when crews from one zone operate into another (as in Salt Lake crews operating 5 and 6 between Sparks and Reno). From time to time the Company and the Unions have expanded these "interdivisional runs", both freight and passenger, complete with provisions for an engineer(s) from one district "working off miles" on other districts when engineers from those districtits operate on his. The early 1970s interdivsional runs between Oakland and Dunsmuir, Oakland and Sparks, and Oakland and San Luis Obispo being the most recent passenger examples. The 1990s hotshot pig train agreements for Oak-San Luis and Oak-Sparks are more recent freight examples.

Edited to add: Bill "Iron Man" Tatum is still around enjoying retirement.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 08/05/16 13:35 by EtoinShrdlu.

Thank you for the update on Bill Tatum. He was a real gentleman and pleasure to work with.Bill Webb

My late father was a Pullman conductor who ran all of the name trains from Chicago to Seattle, L.A. and San Francisco the 50's, 60's and 70's. He went thru multiple train crews as he was responsible for being up at every stop wetherr he had a passenger or not. And yes he had a compartment to sleep in when he had a chance unless the train was over booked. Arrived in the afternoon, overnighted and returned the next day. I never heard him complain and when he was home he keep to a regular daily schedule, never could figure out how he did it.

LaJunta had a brakeman slot on the passenger trains. LJ to KCK. 554 miles. Three districts, as LJ to Dodge City, DDC to Newton, and on to KCK.
Lance, didn't you talk about that once?

Just for perspective... 171 miles Atlanta-Augusta on the Georgia RR was considered a long run in the eastern U.S.

Conductors on today's Lake Shore Limited operate between Albany-Rensselaer and Cleveland - 476.6 miles.  So did the engineer and assistant engineer from about 1986 until about 1995 when the "engineer only for 6 hours or less" agreement took effect.
Andy

SD45X Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> LaJunta had a brakeman slot on the passenger
> trains. LJ to KCK. 554 miles. Three districts, as
> LJ to Dodge City, DDC to Newton, and on to KCK.
> Lance, didn't you talk about that once?

I ain't Lance, but have a friend who was engineer on 3 & 4. At one time they worked KC to La Junta. It was a rare night when he made it in 12 hours. Eventually they were cut back to Dodge City.

Fred in Wichita

Some past TO discussions if you want to do more research on the longest runs-  <http://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?1,2896858,2896858#msg-2896858&gt;

mapboy

An old engineer on the Middle Division told me back about 1952 that the Santa Fe's top trains that used the Ottawa cutoff ran engine crews from the Kansas City pool all the way to La Junta.  (That is about 530 miles.)  They hardly stopped anywhere and, of course, that was the racetrack.  They never had crews die on those trains.  They got their miles in pretty quickly.  I remember seeing a curve speed limit sign from our car on US 50 that was 90 mph for passenger trains.   This same engineer (Al Shannon) told a a few other stories from his steam days that I will never forget.  

SD45X Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> LaJunta had a brakeman slot on the passenger
> trains. LJ to KCK. 554 miles. Three districts, as
> LJ to Dodge City, DDC to Newton, and on to KCK.
> Lance, didn't you talk about that once?

Those weren't technically brakemen. These were baggagemen slots, who weren't under the hours of service when working. They were covered by trainman and when they laid off, protected from the appropriate extra boards. I worked Newton to Dodge City, so if our baggageman laid off and I was on the extra board and stood for the job, I would deadhead by auto to Kansas City to get my rest to protect #3 as baggageman to LaJunta, then back the same night on # 4 from LaJunta to Kansas City, then deadhead back to the extra board in Newton.