Western Railroad Discussion > Cloudy July 5th around Lenexa, Olathe KS

After shooting around Carrollton in the morning on Saturday, we drove over to Lenexa, Kansas to visit with my sister-in-law. When the girls decided to go shopping, I was given the go-ahead (thank goodness:}) to head out for about 2 hours to take pictures and yes, the weather was still really cruddy:{

I had spotted an old depot at Lenexa on a previous visit and decided to head over there first and ended up waiting for over a half an hour. Out of sheer boredom, I called fellow TO member "oyw" to ask him if he knew of any other spots nearby that might have some better train action. He knew of nothing close by but did inform me of some local power that would probably be parked just to the South of my location and another main line that was just a little further to the West.

1)While on the phone with Bob, a train finally showed up in the form of BNSF 8877 South passing by the Lenexa depot.

2)Trying to judge the right spot where to get the depot with the rear DPU's going away, I was a little off and cropped out the sign as BNSF 9816 in Grinstein paint with some strange number boards passed by.

3)Heading further South to try and locate the local power, I found it with this nice pair of Cascade Green engines. GP39M 2740 and GP50 3131 were on the point of a lengthy cut of cars.

Three More Pictures Posted Below.................
14 pictures total will be posted!

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I also found 2 shoving platforms and an old Santa Fe caboose, all in pretty decent shape and none had any BNSF markings!

4)ATSF 999543, a CE-9 class waycar that showed it was "Condemned 6-91".

5)BN 12606

6)BN 12416

Three More Pictures Posted Below..............

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6)BNSF 5909 heads North with an empty coal train. I accidentally bumped the camera into a wrong setting, thus this shot came out a little grainy:{

7)Further to the South, I found another local with GP28P 1547, GP38-2 2358 and GP39-2 2783 still in Santa Fe paint.

8)Southbound UP train AAMEW-05 (Auto-Armourdale-Englewood/Houston) heads South on this BNSF line. I'm guessing since it originated at Armourdale yard, it uses some sort of trackage rights to get out of Kansas City? This train also usually has some kind of pool power on a daily basis but not today! It just has this pair of UP engines led by the 7678.

Three More Pictures Posted Below..................

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10)I then decided to head to the ex-Santa Fe line and just North of Olathe, KS, I found the BNSF 8076 stopped short of a crossing.

I was in my car waiting for the traffic light when the crossing gates went down, I figured it was just the 8076 starting to move but it was another train coming!

11)I jumped out of the car to grab the 5218 with a pair of CSXT engines passing the 8076. Luckily no one was parked behind me:}

12)I decided to try and chase this train but made the mistake of getting off of the highway at Gardner and could only just barely beat him before he entered the town of Edgerton so just another grab shot but Hey, some sun!

Last Pair of Pictures Posted Below.....................

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Love the GREEN GP30 carbody! Great series, thanks for sharing!

13)At the new Intermodal facility located near Gardner, I found this pair of gray SD40-2 leasers. ITSX 7914 and ITSX 6253 shot across a field.

14)On the way home to Lenexa, I headed back over to the Ft. Scott Sub. and found BNSF 5309 and UP 6655 tied down in a center siding with a northbound rock train at Bonita.

I tried shooting the BNSF 8076 heading South down the Ft. Scott line next, I'm guessing it used a connecting track at Olathe but one of the local authorities did not like me standing on the embankment and pulled over to see my ID just as the train was showing up. Oh well!

Thanks for scrolling through more cloudy shots:}

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SP8595 Wrote:
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> I had spotted an old depot at Lenexa on a previous
> visit

Thanks for the photos from some of my old stomping grounds!

Actually the "old depot" is a fairly new depot built by the city a few years ago (late 1980's or early 1990's) as part of a downtown beautification effort. The "old" Lenexa Frisco depot resides in a park a mile or two west of Quivera on 87th Street, along with an old Northern Pacific caboose painted in BN green.

Here are pictures of the old Frisco caboose and a former Northern Pacific caboose that resides in a park in Lenexa. These pictures were taken in 2008.

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GOOD stuff...!!! Thanks for sharing.

Another great series of photos John. Looks like you had a good 4th of July weekend.

Ronda Thomas