Oh I’m sure the standard operations will still include diesel for many reasons - but there is at least a chance it could happen now - where before it 100% couldn’t happen.

The 261 trip I mentioned above - it was Amtrak policy that an Amtrak diesel had to be in the consist - and yet, when Amtrak couldn’t figure out how to get a spare diesel to Minneapolis - they ran without.

My .01% lucky chance was with the 261 so I’ll doubt I’ll see it with the 4014 but maybe someone else will! Haha.

Someone else HAS..haha !!

My friend, Sean Reed, works for the UP in the PTC department. Sean pretty much grew up at the Cotton Belt shops in Pine Bluff, Arkansas, helping to restore and operate 819, and his path has brought him to a management position in the PTC department. His latest job, imagine that, was testing and signing off on 4014's PTC install. UP now approves it as equivalent to any of their diesels, and self-contained. As seen on Facebook, the PTC system now lives in a locker on the side of the tender, that used to contain the cab signal system. It shares most of it's parts with the diesel system, so most repairs can be made out of standard off-the-shelf parts.

It does not have any interconnection to the throttle. Only brakes.

The test runs were made without a diesel. As I understand it, 4014 may run without the diesel on shorter trips on flatter territory.

What - I thought it would never be done!? :-p haha.

Hey maybe that .01% chance is closer to a 5% chance now! I gotta catch the Empress first though - hopefully on her way back north!

For all the “it can’t be done! It’s impossible” crowd - 4014 departed Cheyenne unassisted! Supposedly picking up a diesel in Rock Springs so she won’t get too far but still gets to show off a bit!

I have never been so happy to be so wrong in my life. What a show.

https://www.trains.com/pro/communicatio ... s-big-boy/

"Union Pacific is able to leverage its back-office infrastructure, software licensing, radio spectrum licensing, maintenance/support capabilities, AAR membership and standards compliance, and FRA approvals for PTC operation on its steam locomotives. These additional requirements and corresponding costs will be a further challenge for many independent groups wishing to operate PTC on “historic” locomotives."

It still just baffles me why historic locomotives being operated in non-freight service weren't just exempted from the PTC mandate. I guess this is what happens when you have bureaucrats that couldn't find their backside with two hands and an anatomy textbook making rules and regulations.

There are a bunch of reasons that come to mind.

But there's a great big one: liability.

Imagine the headline if an excursion had an accident and the equipment wasn't "following modern safety standards".

Then there's the fact that, maybe, the tech actually does improve safety.

years ago I was working an NS Mainline and was chatting with one of the guys (who is sadly no longer with us) and I asked "why do you have to do it that way?" and he said one of my favorite quotes ever -

"Cause everyone is afraid of their own shadow and nobody knows how to run a railroad"

Historic equipment is exempt from ditch lights, which probably have a ten times better chance of preventing some sort of accident than PTC does, and the window of exposure for anyone, especially if you exclude UP is absolutely minuscule. When #765 ran excursions on NS a few years ago, NS wouldn't even let it pass a moving train. The put all the freights in the hole until she passed, never mind the. 40 MPH speed limit. My personal opinion of PTC is that if you actually need it, you had no business running railroad equipment in the first place.

I remember that the impetus that mandated PTC was several head on collisions with fatalities and property damage in which one crew had fallen asleep, in a short period of time around twenty years ago. The last straw as I recall was such a head on on UP's GS route, which killed the sleeping crew, injured the crew of the other train who had to bail out at speed, and strewed tank cars all over. Ditch lights didn't fix that. Perhaps PTC was overkill, but I haven't heard of a head on at track speed on a mainline, only in terminal settings, since PTC was implemented.

Thinking about it for even a moment will tell you that the types of accidents that PTC helps prevent are far bigger than the one ditch lights do.

Ditch lights help with vehicle and pedestrian strikes (theoretically, anyway).

PTC helps prevent events that show up on the national news.

Maybe everything that's new isn't automatically bad?

While wrapped in the message of safety, PTC really is all about the future automation of trains as the technology matures. First one man trains, then full auto. With every run today, they are collecting data.

We all know Ed likes things stuffed, mounted and the human knowledge and experience of actual operations in different environments lost forever. :-(

Bob