Prototype News

Service on the Long Island Rail Road came to a halt on May 16 after 3,500 workers walked off the job. It was the first strike on the railroad in more than 30 years and was sure to wreak havoc on the Monday morning commute if a resolution could not be found.

The Long Island Rail Road is America’s busiest commuter railroad, moving more than 300,000 passengers per day. But front-line employees, including locomotive engineers and signalmen, have been working without a new contract for years. While the Long Island Rail Road’s parent, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, has secured deals with unions at its other railroads, a compromise has been elusive on the LIRR.

“The LIRR owns this strike. Union workers have sacrificed so much for the railroad for years while consistently bargaining in good faith for a fair contract,” said Teamsters General President Sean O’Brien. “Hundreds of thousands of commuters rely on our members’ labor every day. The LIRR is stranding passengers while denying wages, benefits and respect to BLET Teamsters and other hardworking union members. All 1.3 million members of the Teamsters Union are standing with every worker on strike. We will win this fight and the LIRR will give these essential workers the contract they’ve earned.”

Media reported late Sunday that the National Mediation Board had summoned the railroad and unions for further talks in hopes of finding a solution.

—Justin Franz 

The post Long Island Rail Road Workers Strike appeared first on Railfan & Railroad Magazine.

by Nick Stewart/photos by the author

On May 9, 1868, the city of Reno, Nev., was founded following the completion of a new station on Central Pacific Railroad, which was pushing east from Sacramento, Calif., toward Utah. That same year, short line Virginia & Truckee Railroad was incorporated and began building track between Carson City and Virginia City, Nev., which was completed the following year.

Reno quickly became a vital hub along the new transcontinental route, as nearby communities such as Virginia City and Carson City could now ship freight to and from the mining districts — including supplies, lumber, and, most importantly, the gold and silver ore that made the region so prosperous in the mid-19th century. V&T capitalized on this connection, completing a line from Carson City to Reno in summer 1872.

ABOVE: A pair of Union Pacific SD70Ms and a GATX SD38-2 (downrated from an SD40-2) take the Fernley Flyer over the Truckee River on the Nevada Subdivision at Painted Rock, Nev., on October 8, 2025.

By the early 20th century, Reno was home to several rail operations. Southern Pacific, which had acquired Central Pacific in 1885, controlled the main line from Sacramento to Ogden, Utah. V&T, though past its peak, continued to handle freight and passengers and extended its reach with a line from Carson City to Minden, Nev., to serve agricultural traffic. Reno Traction Company, incorporated in 1904, operated streetcars until 1920, while Nevada Interurban leased its trackage to provide service along Plumas Street from 1909 to 1919. Meanwhile, the narrow gauge Nevada-California-Oregon Railway, organized in 1880 and headquartered in Reno, would become Western Pacific’s Reno Branch by 1918.

Western Pacific merged into Union Pacific in 1982, followed by Southern Pacific in 1996, leaving UP as the sole owner of the region’s three main lines; BNSF Railway gained trackage rights across northern Nevada following the 1996 merger. While Reno’s original passenger trains and streetcar systems are long gone, Amtrak’s California Zephyr still calls at Reno twice daily.

ABOVE: Union Pacific GP60 1109 and GP40N 1475 make a run down the Mina Subdivision with the Wabuska Local near Silver Springs on January 5, 2025. 

The original Virginia & Truckee declined steadily after the turn of the century and was abandoned in 1950. In the mid-1970s, steam-powered excursion trains returned to portions of the right-of-way following reconstruction. Today, the revived Virginia & Truckee operates both steam and diesel excursions between Mound House (Carson City Eastgate Station) and Virginia City, largely following the original route.

As is the case with many rail hubs in the U.S., Reno is not as diverse as it once was, but one can still find interesting rail operations in the area. It took me many years to appreciate my local operations. What opened my eyes was the work of photojournalist Ted Benson, who spent a lot of time photographing Nevada rail operations in the 1970s. After settling on journalism for my career, I became determined to document every rail operation that I have in my neighborhood.

ABOVE: Ex-McCloud River Railroad 18, a 2-8-2 Mikado built in 1914, passes the historic depot at Gold Hill, Nev., on the reconstructed Virginia & Truckee on October 20, 2024. Locomotive 18 was acquired by the V&T Railway Commission in 2005 and operates on select weekend excursions out of the railroad’s Carson City Eastgate Depot between May and October.

Sparks Yard
One of the most significant railroad towns in Nevada is Sparks — my hometown. We call ourselves the Rail City. Sparks was established in 1904 when SP relocated its yard and facilities from Wadsworth to new ground just east of Reno. Reno, of course, had already been a rail hub since Central Pacific completed the transcontinental line.

Southern Pacific built a roundhouse and shop complex here in addition to the yard. Those shop buildings remained part of the modern Sparks Yard until early 2025, though they had not been used by the railroad for decades. During the steam era, a wide range of power could be found here, from small 0-6-0 switchers to massive 4-8-8-2 cab-forwards.

ABOVE: Union Pacific C44ACM 9833, rebuilt from an ex-Chicago & North Western C44-9W, passes stored Bethlehem hoppers and ex-Western Pacific searchlight signals at Hawley, Calif., on the Winnemucca Subdivision on October 3, 2025.

Today, Sparks remains an important point on UP. It marks the transition between the Roseville Subdivision over Donner Pass and the Nevada Subdivision across the desert. The yard serves as a crew change point, and trains frequently set out and pick up cars. A little more than a dozen trains pass through daily, along with several locals that originate here. Yard jobs shuffle cars throughout the day, providing plenty of action for observers.

The west end of Sparks Yard is fairly accessible for railfans, and the towers of Nugget Casino Resort make a distinctive backdrop. Several industries near the main line are switched Monday through Friday. While GP38s and GP40s are common on these assignments, I was fortunate to catch a pair of SD40s and GP15s working the yard during a visit in late fall…

The post RENO: Railfanning from the Sierra to the Great Basin appeared first on Railfan & Railroad Magazine.

by Paul B. Larsen/photos by the author

Nestled at the doorstep of Death Valley lies one of California’s most valuable mining operations. While not the kind of discovery to prompt a cry of “Eureka!,” the resources first identified by gold-seeker John Searles in the valley just east of Ridgecrest — later named in his honor — have proven far more valuable than the gold and silver that dominate California lore.

Since the late 1800s, extraction of soda ash, boric acid, and other minerals has fueled a largely prosperous run for the succession of companies that have worked these deposits. Of course, an operation of this scale depends on a reliable connection to the outside world — a role long filled by the railfan-favorite Trona Railway, which replaced the famed 20-mule teams that once hauled product to Southern Pacific at Mojave.

ABOVE: During summer months, sun angles often allowed for catching northbound trains in daylight as happened for this loaded coal train in late April 2023.

Trona Railway’s birth in 1914 coincided with the early stages of large-scale mining of trona ore (a naturally occurring mineral, sodium sesquicarbonate) in the Searles Valley by American Trona Company, primarily by extraction with water pumped in to draw out the minerals for subsequent processing. The purpose of the railway, lovingly referred to as the “Three Elephant Line” because they could arguably do the work of those 20 mules, has almost exclusively been to bring in supplies such as sulfuric acid for mineral extraction while taking out finished product for a connection with Southern Pacific — and more recently Union Pacific — at Searles Junction on the Lone Pine Subdivision.

Mixed in with the coming and going of covered hoppers that carry product to the outside world, until just recently the railway was also the conduit for a steady supply of coal to be used for generation of electricity for the energy-hungry drying kilns at the Argus facility, which is the main processing and distribution plant for Searles Valley Minerals and the location of Trona Railway’s headquarters, sorting yard, and shops.

ABOVE: Black Friday often produced unique photo opportunities, as on this day the railroad would make the run up to Searles Junction in the morning such as on November 26, 2021.

In prior years that represented a prolonged boom time, most days on the railroad were like any other. The day shift would sort cars at Argus and at an off-site processing plant known as Westend a few miles south, and the night shift often would make the 30-mile journey south to the UP connection to deliver loads, retrieve empties, and, as needed, hustle a coal train back into town. This all has been in conjunction with an intraplant switching operation, which is in part handled by one of the last “Kodachrome”-painted ex-SP locomotive in existence and is responsible for moving coal trains around, along with sorting covered hopper cars based on commodity grade and type to be stored until ready for shipping.

Rumblings of Change
As with any endeavor, good times are fleeting, and since 2019, the fortunes of both the railroad and the mining operation it supports have changed dramatically. Pressures have mounted to the point where both are now struggling.

ABOVE: On October 14, 2021, a long telephoto lens gives a unique perspective on a southbound Trona Railway train that has begun its climb up and out of the Searles Lake basin, seen in the distance at the foot of the now-shuttered Argus plant. In the midground is the Oxy yard, used for overflow car storage.

Across two days in early July 2019, the Ridgecrest and Searles Valley communities were rocked by a swarm of earthquakes and aftershocks, the largest measuring Mw 7.1 — one of the most powerful in California in the past 30 years, and strong enough to send residents fleeing outdoors. The damage was extensive, affecting the community, the plant, and the railroad. In places near the Trona Pinnacles, the track resembled a length of model railroad flex track that had been picked up and twisted.

To this day, parts of Searles Valley remain damaged, awaiting rebuilding that may never come. While the Argus plant suffered heavily, including the loss of a smokestack and other facilities, it was able to reopen. Likewise, in a testament to the determination of the railroad’s crews, the line to Searles Junction was rebuilt with remarkable speed, and service was soon restored.

Literal and figurative aftershocks have continued since for the mine and its railroad, the latter of which have nothing to do with fault slippage but instead are the result of difficult economic and regulatory headwinds. In the nearly seven years since the Ridgecrest earthquakes, the boom times have progressively become more dire to the point that the very existence of the mining and railroad operations is in question…

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