Union Pacific Railroad Albert Lea Subdivision (St Paul to Mason City, IA)

[JASII]

I am looking for a bit more information about the Union Pacific Railroad (Albert Lea Subdivision-St Paul to Mason City, IA). I gather that the road frequency in use is 160.845 MHz AAR CH 4949. It looks like they are dispatched out of the Harriman Dispatching Center in Omaha. When a track warrant is issued for the Albert Lea Subdivision, starting at Saint Paul, how far down the line is that track warrant valid for? Is it referred to as a "segment"? Also, how many radio towers are there on the Albert Lea Subdivision? I suspect that there are a number of them between Saint Paul and Mason City. Would Owatonna be the next one down the line?

I checked the FCC database and it looks like one of the nearby towers is in Hastings Minnesota.


Am I correct in assuming that once the train is underway, one of the next things that might be heard on 160.845 is the hotbox detectors in Rosemount at MP 337.8? After that, Waterford MP 315.62? Then Medford MP 290.3? Is somewhere between 20 or 30 miles fairly typical distances between hotbox detectors for Union Pacific Railroad?

If the train is operating normally, is it safe to assume that there might not be much traffic on the radio channel, other than hotbox detectors, until it it time to get another track warrant to travel through a another area?

 

[cbehr91]

Anymore track warrants are issued via PTC and not over the radio. The only thing you might hear is something like, "Dispatcher to UP 9876 east/west/north/south I sent you warrant 123456. Ok to verify? Looks good dispatcher. Roger, dispatcher out."

The FCC database should show where all the dispatcher bases are located, but typically they're spaced ~20 miles apart, but that can vary with terrain, etc. Same goes for defect detectors.

 

[JASII]

That is very good to know. Thank you. That certainly must have reduced voice radio traffic a lot since going to PTC.

Are the Union Pacific hotbox detectors still voice?

 

[ak7an]

Union Pacific Hot Box detectors are still analog voice, but they only give an entrance message the the train arrives on the approach circuit.
Some subdivisions are not PTC so some track warrants are still issued verbally.

 

[JASII]

AK7AN, thank you for that. Do you know how big of an area a track warrant on the Albert Lea sub is typically for?