Passenger Trains > Metra Heritage (GM&O) train sits with B/O power for over 2 hrs

An inbound Metra Heritage Corridor train sat near Brighton Park for more than two hours after an engine failure.
Metra had to send a rescue engine from Western Ave. coach yard on the old Milwaukee Rd. 
to tow the train in.

Pity the poor crew member in the video.

https://chicago.cbslocal.com/2018/12/03/metra-heritage-corridor-delayed/

One of the worst places to break down.  Only a few Metra trains Mo-Fr with no
support facilities and on a passenger hostile railroad.  Must have been No. 918, the
last inbound of the morning rush (and the entire day).  No following train to tie on and
push.

The two hours waiting for a rescue engine was actually about as fast as it could happen.
Find a Metra crew qualified out to Brighton Park on the CN (probably the crew of 916), round up
some power, wait for paperwork from the CN, then a trip back through CUS out to Brighton Park.

Link to Heritage Corridor schedule
https://metrarail.com/sites/default/files/metra_79899_fm90_tt_joliet_proof_herttage_corridor.pdf



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 12/03/18 18:53 by Englewood.

I wonder how significant the "passenger hostile" part was in this. Hawthorne Yard is 5-6 miles away, I wonder if CN had a unit they could spare. 

inCHI Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I wonder how significant the "passenger hostile"
> part was in this. Hawthorne Yard is 5-6 miles
> away, I wonder if CN had a unit they could
> spare. 

It's a great idea but in the real railroad world, I can't see why CN would help Metra unless it's in the way of their freight operations?



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/03/18 21:29 by ghemr.

inCHI Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I wonder how significant the "passenger hostile"
> part was in this. Hawthorne Yard is 5-6 miles
> away, I wonder if CN had a unit they could
> spare.

Same problem. Even if CN had a spare engine, how do you get transportation and/or a crew to get it? Time wise it's all about the same.

98 was the rescue engine. What was the engine that failed?

That makes sense, I forgot that a crew would have to be called and more is involved.

inCHI Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> That makes sense, I forgot that a crew would have
> to be called and more is involved.

This is the result when the public passenger roads separate themselves from the road that owns the track.
The owning railroad owes no allegiance to the passenger train.
When the owning railroad operated the passenger train a quick fix would have been found.
The passenger employees would have all been known by the yardmasters and other crews.  Everybody would know 
old Joe the No. 1 engineer on the suburban train.  The Glenn yard YM would have sent one of the lead jobs
up behind No. 918, the crew would have cut in the air and shoved the train to CUS. The lead job would have been back
in Glenn yard in 45 minutes.  The YM would pay them the lunch penalty to catch up on the work they left while shoving No. 918.

Nobody would even think of doing that now.  Why take on the liability?  What if the switch engine made a hard coupling and
one of those old ladies ended up on her a**?  Besides there are probably no CN (IC) crew even qualified into CUS.

Those who advocate "open access" for freight trains should keep this in mind.  



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/05/18 13:42 by Englewood.