The Illinois Railway Museum is presenting a new and improved trolley pageant this year for 2009. The pageant has moved from the streetcar line to the open and photogenic mainline area. This year the pageant will allow the interurban car to pose alongside a traditional mid-western landscape. Equipment that cannot negotiate the tight curves of the street car line will have a chance to participate in this year's pageant. Electric locomotives will be leading realistic freight trains of their time along with rolling stock sensitive to each background. Pantograph equipment such as the Illinois Central Electric MU "wicker baskets" and South Shore Line interurban cars, representing the south side of Chicago and northwestern Indiana, will make a rare appearance. Streetcars will line up as they did in downtown Chicago and the rapid transit fleet will display its quick deceleration and fast acceleration. The past pageant offered each piece of equipment to review while standing still, while this year a dozen of the trains will be selected to review during a run by. Certain trains that have been selected to run by will set the scene of the electric era that many have never had the chance to experience. This year on the 4th of July at IRM the videos come to life, the pictures come to life and memories along with stories are seen. Please support the Trolley Pageant and join us at the Illinois Railway Museum for a step back in time. There will be other attractions as well: trolley buses operate, streetcar service and mainline electric and diesel trains operate, and the West End Jazz Band will be playing live. Additional information can be found on the IRM website at http://www.irm.org.

The weather wasn't the most cooperative, but IRM's Trolley Pageant was (to this one man's opinion) a significant upgrade from years past. And there was nothing wrong with years past either !!

Moving the pageant from the streetcar loop to the mainline allowed for a greater variety of equipment to operate, including cars with pans, operations at speed, larger equipment, and special runs such as multiple trolley freights (It was reported some 2 dozen plus freight cars were made available by IRM's Freight Car Dept.)

The weather did limit some of the planned operations, as the rain would have had a seriously detrimental effect on some of the cars operational, yet not fully restored and watertight. Having said that, there was a noticeable number of cars out and about that hadn't seen the light of day in quite a while.

Circumstances dictated that I didn't get there till mid-morning, and I had to leave literally two cars into the Pageant, but what I did see and photograph I'm happy to share.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/19332706@N00/se

A great effort by ALL departments at IRM, hoping this new format becomes the standard going forward.

And as noted elsewhere, is this not just the best damn 6 or so weeks to be alive in the Midwest ? Start with this, TrainFestival at the end of the month, related trips here in Chicago after TrainFestival with the 4449, and follow it up in August with IRM's Diesel Days. Taking nothing away from operations at East Troy, Hesston, Monticello (just to name a few) someone managing to attend even just these events (all within a roughly 250 odd mile radius of Chicago) will see literally dozens of pieces of equipment in operation. 2009 is going to be a year long remembered.

Enjoy

This link should work for John's photos:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/19332706@N00/sets/72157620854293601/

well, you folks really pulled out the stops! I would have liked to be there.

It was especially good to see the electroliner out of the barn; I have not seen her out of the barn in many years!

Ted Miles

I saw several pantograph cars running.

Don't underestimate the size of that undertaking. That reflects serious effort by their overhead lines department and car department. Keeping pans happy is hard...

This was the 23rd Trolley Pageant I've seen at IRM, and by far the best.

The freight train runby with the Illinois Terminal Class B was most impressive, with the locomotive pulling enough current to leave a 10 foot long wake of steam behind the trolley wheel, due to the somewhat "damp" weather.

Jeff