Western KY question

[firemedic2150]

I don’t know a lot about railroad activity in Western Ky but I came across something I think is odd but may be normal so I will throw this out since I am not a big railroad guy and not from here. My wife and I went to Patti’s for lunch and were headed over the Ky dam bridge, and I met a CSX train on the P&L line. I turned on my radio and heard the CSX train on Ch 42 the P&L road getting a track warrant for the line. The part that puzzled me when he called he used his CSX train number. This may be normal but I was confused with a CSX train operating on a foreign rail using his CSX train symbol.

 

[wa8pyr]

I don’t know a lot about railroad activity in Western Ky but I came across something I think is odd but may be normal so I will throw this out since I am not a big railroad guy and not from here. My wife and I went to Patti’s for lunch and were headed over the Ky dam bridge, and I met a CSX train on the P&L line. I turned on my radio and heard the CSX train on Ch 42 the P&L road getting a track warrant for the line. The part that puzzled me when he called he used his CSX train number. This may be normal but I was confused with a CSX train operating on a foreign rail using his CSX train symbol.

Depends on the "rules of the road" for the railroad they're running on. Foreign trains operating on CSX get a Znnn symbol, but if they're getting a track warrant on the radio, they'll usually give their home-road symbol at least once. I suspect what you heard may be something similar.

 

[buddrousa]

We see CSX, UP, BNSF, CP and CN on the CN lines often at Fulton that comes from the Cario side and also from the Fulton to Paducah side moving to Memphis Tn both north and south. Here they ID as UPxxxx or BNSFxxxx ect.

 

[AK9R]

Railroads share locomotives regularly. It's easier to "run through" the power at interchange points rather than change locomotives. The railroads keep track of "horsepower-hours" that are used by foreign locomotives and they shift locomotives around to work off horsepower-hours so that they don't have to pay actual money to the other railroad.

You can't necessarily identify a train by the name on the lead locomotive. You'll see UP and BNSF power in the east and CSX and NS power in the west.

 

[kib669]

Paducah & Louisville RR is owned by P&L Transportation (previously known as Four Rivers Transportation), which itself is controlled by CSX Corporation (parent company to CSX Transportation, its railroad division). You will also find CN trains going to what was at one time called (don't remember who owns it now) the Badget Rail Terminal (BRT) where coal is transfers directly from train cars to barges. I would bet the CSX train was doing the same thing. CSX has an interchange with the P&L on the south side of Madisonville, about 50 miles E.

 

[jbhunt04]

It’s fairly common for CSX coal trains to run down the P&L to the coal terminal at the lakes.