Posted on Facebook tonight:



401 is an EMD SD7 in Delta, Utah still in its original "warbonnet" NN p[aint scheme; 201 is an RSD-4 currently at the Northwest Railroad Museum in Washington State.

Photos at https://www.facebook.com/nnry1/posts/10159462599731764

Some more context.

ALCO RSD-4 blt 5/1951 as Kennecott Copper #201
now operational at the Northwest Railroad Museum in Snoqualmie, WA
(the only surviving of the not so succesfull RSD-4)

EMD SD-7 blt 8/1952 as Nevada Northern #401
now parking at the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power in Delta, UT
(operational status unknown to me)

Anybody know why that unrelated movements now in such a hurry?

#201 C-C Alco RSD-4A C/N 11554 1951 1600 HP
Kennecott Copper #201 Ray, AZ
Kennecott Copper #201 Ely, NV
Kennecott Copper #909 Bingham, UT
Puget Sound Ry Historical Assn. 1983
Northwest Ry Museum 1999
Nevada Northern RR 2021

The statement on the Nevada Northern web page that:

" Locomotive 401’s trip is only 163 miles, but it is on the Loneliest Road in America, US Highway 50. This is a narrow two-lane highway that crosses some of the most desolate areas in the country"

puts me on my toes a bit because as we all know US50- starts in Ocean City, Md and goes all the way to Sacramento and not all of it is a 2 lane highway.

Also the segments in "desolate areas" may be easier to cross because there may not be any over head clearances to worry about.

Also, if the plan is to restore these engines so that they can be operated on the Nevada Northern this raises the issue of "why can't repairs on one (or both) of them be made where they are now so that they can be moved by rail."

Bob H

Also, if the plan is to restore these engines so that they can be operated on the Nevada Northern this raises the issue of "why can't repairs on one (or both) of them be made where they are now so that they can be moved by rail."

Bob H[/quote]


I would surmise that at least one of them have plain axle bearings, which is the kiss of death for moving anything on class 1 roads

Not to mention the Nevada Northern's mainline is mostly moribund, so even if they could move the trains to Shafter that's still a 150 mile trip via truck anyways.

Clearly you are unfamiliar with U.S. Highway 50 in the western United States. From its break from I-70 in eastern Utah all the way to the western Nevada border it is an extremely desolate, extremely isolated, extremely rugged two-lane highway through some of the emptiest country anybody will ever travel through. It crosses one mountain range after another in the Great Basin's basin-and-range topography that consists of dozens of north-south running mountain ranges split by low-lying alkaline lakebeds. It is a very difficult road for moving something as large as a diesel locomotive. Overhead clearances provide very little advantage when you're going up and down 6 to 8 per cent gradients in winding narrow canyons. "Easier to cross" my eye. Its main advantage is that it's a direct shot - the shortest route, cutting something to the tune of 200 miles from the only other alternative: running north to Tooele, getting on I-80, heading west to Wendover, then backtracking south again on US 93 ALT.




You overlook a major detail here - there is no rail connection to the Nevada Northern. So even if the 401 were to be moved by rail to the closest siding (Wendover), it would still need to be loaded onto a truck to make the final 119 miles to Ely, which saves an entirety of 44 road miles. Whoop-dee-doo. It is far easier to just throw the thing on a lowboy and truck it instead of having to involve the extra expense and headache of dealing with a class I railroad that doesn't want to move it and adding an extra 197 mile unnecessary rail journey for a total trip of 316 miles. How would rail even be remotely considered by any reasonable person?



LADWP is a stakeholder, but it's actually at the Intermountain Power Project plant near (but not in) Delta. IPP provides power for a large portion of the Great Basin in addition to its California customers.

From what I understand, it "ran when parked." I don't imagine that very much work will be needed to get it operational again, but we'll leave that to the NN shops once they get it.

The move from IPP may be related to their commitment to convert the plant from coal to natural gas and hydrogen by 2025. Without the IPPX-owned coal fleet, they may no longer see any need to keep a plant switcher on standby since the rail access in the generator building can be handled by trackmobiles.

I happened to open up a Nevada state-issued highway map I snagged on my recent Western trip.

"The Loneliest Road in America' was plastered above a section of US 50, almost like either a marketing slogan or an ominous warning.

There's another highway that contends for that title, however: US 93 from Phoenix to Las Vegas. I used to have to drive a long stretch of that road, from I-40 to Wickenburg, on a regular basis for a job that quickly was changed for other reasons. The van I drove had both an instruction book with special instructions for that route, including the locations of special non-public gas pumps and phones and access codes/pass cards to them, and a satellite cell phone to be used only in emergencies. The one time I saw a potentially life-threatening scenario, the state police blew past me with lights on just as I had to make a decision whether to personally intervene or not.

Honestly, it is probably easier to move historic rail equipment via road these days, than dealing with Class I railroads. The price point is also probably a wash, given your particular circumstances. You don't have to deal with alignment control couplers, or having someone mess with your air brake setup, especially if they are unfamiliar with older brake schedules, or having the equipment subject to vandalism en route somewhere.

One big advantage of moving via road is that the number of people you can contact to find the status of the move is infinitely smaller than dealing with a Class I.

I know of one organization that reached out to UP to get a quote to move a diesel locomotive dead in tow. The only rate various reps of UP would give is the "special move" rate that requires a special crew and movement, like how Siemens Charger locomotives are delivered.

I wonder sometimes about great marketers and the real need or urgency. Just how much of this is click bait?
Afterall just last week they announced the completion of 81.

Robby Peartree

You should drive US 93 or 95 across Nevada; each with many desolate miles.

Story I read once said that when Life (or was it Look) Magazine called up the auto club in Utah and asked what was the loneliest road the west. man who answered later said that he was thinking of US 6 but said US 50. Well, the communities along US 50 picked up on this and turned it into a marketing tool.

But the real winner is US 6 across Utah and Nevada. I've driven it in both Nevada and Utah. US 6 has fewer locations of habitation than US 50. It is US6 that a trip from Delta to Ely would transverse.

One time when I was eastbound on US 50 headed toward Ely, I was waved down by a westbound Nevada Highway Patrol officer and told to get clear of the paved travel lanes (both of them). Almost immediately I found a nice solid location, pulled over, and soon saw the reason -- the NHP was helping to escort a gigantic, open-pit-mining dump truck being transported by low-boy trailer. The load took up the entire paved roadway.

NN responded that neither locomotive was in suitable condition to be put dead in tow on class 1 rails. Not even having to mention the fact that there’s no operation between the former NN mainline connection and Ely.

To add to the answers posted about moving the locomotives by rail, one factor that hasn’t yet been mentioned is the Northwest Railway Museum has no outside rail connection at all.

Jeff Moore
Elko, NV

This is wonderful news. The #201 is a great locomotive and one I rode on a handful of times when I was a volunteer at Snoqualmie. It sure would be nice to see the old girl again. One of the smoothest riding locomotives I have ever been on.

Yesterday Port of Longview Alco #770 was loaded onto a truck for shipment to Snoqualmie. The same truck will load the #201 and take her to Ely.

#770 Alco C/N 69236 HH-660 03-40
Northern Pacific #125>600
Walla Walla Valley RR #770 12-49
Relco #770 Longview, WA 06-71 (used to switch Continental Grain)
Port of Longview #770
Northwest Railroad Museum Snoqualmie, WA 12-01
(shipped to Snoqualmie 11-02-21)
http://www.trainweb.org/westernrails/wa/pol-770_jb.jpg