The Tiny Railroad Frozen In Time
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- Опубліковано 10 лют 2025
- Today, we check out Iowa Traction; a tiny railroad in Northern Iowa that uses electric locomotives exclusively from the 1910's and 1920's. Get ready to see bizarre modus operandi, whacky ways of servicing equipment, and even distributed power as it was done 100 years ago, on Iowa Traction; America's Last Interurban.
The two guys who ran the railroad back in the 80's 👇
• Iowa Traction Railroad...
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"... the best way to preserve a machine is to use it."
WELL SAID!
fr, so many places are scared to run stuff cause its expensive to fix if stuff does break, but leaving it sit long term is a sure fire way to help it never run again.
I think of it as a 'ship of Theseus' type of issue.
Constant use will require certain parts to be replaced over time, how long until that historic engine is nothing more than a reproduction?
@@k.o.h3599We were 3 weeks apart watching this.
From 1996 to 2006, I delivered freight to Mason City, saw these wonderful pieces of machinery almost every trip. Painted mostly orange.
The fact that these survived ww2
The fact that they survived the beginning of the diesel era in my opinion
Probably rather the middle years of the diesel era, when a market for second-hand locomotives had already emerged and those electric locomotives were finally reaching the end of their expected lifespan.
@@cubasfidelcastro it is still quite something that long after the people who first ran, these things are dead and gone, and indeed, probably their children and some of their grand children are gone These things are STILL in regular service! The fact that there are talks of introducing diesel switchers to assist in these freight movements still doesn’t mean all that much as what was mentioned in the video that both the railroad and the people wanting to buy it, both expressed a desire to keep these things running indefinitely
It’s not that surprising that they survived the war, it’s more surprising that they survived the dieselization after the war
@@844SteamFan yeah especially since the majority of Americas electric railroads went pretty much the same way as the steam engine between the 1960s and 1980s. The Milwaukee roads electric operations went away and so did Conrail freight operations. If I remember correctly in terms of mainline electric operations, Amtrak’s northeast corridor is literally the only one left.
Also, on a sidenote, that is a great channel icon and 844 is my favorite surviving steam locomotive even if the Dreyfuss Hudson is my all-time favorite
I love how they still use them and take care of them, because the higher ups do understand the historic value of the trains
locomotives*
Those locos are strictly 600 V DC. They take 600 V from the contact wire and use it in 600 V DC traction motors. Except for the AC diesel-electrics that have AC traction motors, diesel electrics have almost universally use 600 V DC for the traction motors. If you look carefully, most of the overhead is catenary messenger wire with hangers holding the contact wire the trolley pole rides on. At 18:20, The overhead is just one wire, the contact wire, leading to a loose catenary over the tangent track. This was probably put up by these guys in a relative hurry. The use of both locos to move all of those cars is more traction from both sets of trucks, more HP, and a reduction of amperage per loco. One loco could handle the brakes on all of those cars as far as control goes. The air compressors of both locos mean less time to recharge the train line. The front loco will handle all braking as with any train with helpers. Almost all subway, street car, and light rail systems use 600V DC for power either from overhead wire or 3rd rail. I am sure that the controls for these locos use a multi-step resistor control stand to control the motors. That would be similar to the old street cars and early diesels because they are very robust and simple. Forward, idle, and reverse are controlled by a separate lever just as any other loco, and there will be heavy copper plates, wires, and contacts because of the heavy amperage. The contact wire is not a round wire but a shaped wire in the form of a squashed 8 or similar so the bottom of the wire is smooth for the trolley pole shoe to ride on. The pole shoe has a contact area of graphite to reduce the wear on the shoe and wire.
I kind of take issue with the claim "Almost all subway, street car, and light rail systems use 600V DC" as 750V DC is far more common on modern systems.
For old systems and some new, like:
MBTA
PATH
NYC Subway (625V on average)
SEPTA Broad St. Line
SEPTA Trolley Lines
SEPTA Norristown Hight Speed Line (630V)
Cleveland
New Orleans (only historic Vehicles)
MUNI Metro
Buffolo Metro Rail (650V)
Houston MetroRail (600 - 750V so I put it in both)
San Diego Trolley
El Paso Streetcar (650V)
M-Line Dalles (only historic Vehicles)
Kenosha, Wisconsin (only PCCs)
Metro Streetcar, Little Rock Arkansas (only historic Vehicles)
MATA Trolley, Memphis (only historic Vehicles)
Loop Trolley St. Louis (only historic Vehicles)
TECO Line Streetcar Tampa (only historic Vehicles)
The L
are 600V or close to it.
But many other are 750V. Mostly newer build systems and those who have been upgraded:
Newark Subway
Hudson-Bergen Lightrail
SEPTA Market-Franctord Line (700V)
PATCO
Baltimore Metro & Lightrail
Washington Metro & DC Streetcar
The T: Pittsburgh Light Rail
Portland Streetcar & MAX
Seattle Streetcar &Tacoma Light Rail
Salt Lake City Streetcar & TRAX
Tucson Streetcar
Atlanta Streetcar & Subway
Dalles Streetcar & DART Lightrail
Charllote CityLynx Gold Line & Lynx Blue Line
KC Streetcar
Connector (Cincinnati)
Q Line (Detroit)
The Hop Millwaikee
Oklahoma City Streetcar (740V)
Tempe Streetcar
RTD Denver
Houston MetroRail (600 - 750V so I put it in both)
Los Angeles
Minneapolis-Saint Paul
The Tide (Norfolk Virginia)
Phoenix
Sancramento
St. Louis
VTA Light Rail
Metrorail (Miami)
Tren Urbano (Puerto Rico)
HART
Exeptions:
LINK Light Rail Seallte is 1.5kV (honestly this surprised me)
BART is 1KV (this didn't surprise me, BART has a lot of Strange things)
Washington Purple Line 1.5KV
So 20 are 600V or close to it. 7 of those are heritage street cars.
32 are 750V or close to it. If I un-group services like Baltimore Metro and Lightrail and Portland Streetcar and Max, it increases from 32 to 41 Systems using 750V or close to it.
Iowa Traction uses bronze trolley wheels, not carbon insert shoes. Interestingly, it's much easier to back pole with a wheel. They must have a heck of a time still finding them. However, trolley museums in many cases are still using trolley wheels, so somebody must still sell them.
@@Jeff-uj8xiYes! I have heard of "back-poling," as you mentioned here. This was discussed in a train article by a Mr. Scott Whitney, retired trainman and railroad fan, up here in the New England area.
Supposedly, the former Claremont (NH) Electric Railroad (or the Claremont and Concord Railway's electrified districts) traveling within the City of Claremont, NH, practiced this "back-poling" process. This is where the forward pole, rather than the trailing pole, is raised up to the overhead contact wire. Having that said contact "wheel" would make it possible without damaging the power's contact pole.
@@Jeff-uj8xiIt shouldn't be that hard to make them. It's a simple bronze casting.
@@Jeff-uj8xi All you need is bronze rod of the right outside diameter, and about 30 minutes on a lathe to make another wheel.
I used to live near the inner urban in Texas that went from Waco through Cleburne and into Fort Worth, it had a couple of branch lines one to Austin and one into to Dallas, I don't think it ever survived into the 30s but I do remember just a few years ago the last surviving power relay station was accidentally knocked over during restoration work!!! 😥
Believe it or not, only recently they standardized with only having the steeple cab locos. They used to have North shore line passenger interurban car, a single truck snow sweeper and a rare Texas electric class A freight motor from 1926.
If I remember right, the North Shore coach actually belongs to the local NRHS chapter and is only operated by Iowa Traction.
Great to see wonderful little locomotives built over 100 years ago still doing what they were built for, says a lot for the workmanship.
Nice to see energy efficient freight haulage
I see the Iowa traction almost every day running cars up and down in between Mason City and clear lake
Awesome! This feels just like a video in the 60’s!
*40's :)
@@RoamingAdhocrat ah, thought they kinda came in with the diesel era a bit.
Beautiful. The last two electric railways on which freight traffic took place in the Berlin area were the "Bullenbahn" in Berlin-Oberschöneweide and the Straussberg Railway. Operations on the "Bullenbahn" ended in 1996 after the last customer had closed his plants. In Straussberg, on the other hand, freight traffic continued until 1993. The largest customer was the Soviet Armed Forces, which had several warehouses in Straussberg. Soviet troops withdrew from Germany by August 1994. After that, there was little to no freight traffic. It was then permanently discontinued in 2007. Greetings from Berlin Germany. Sven
I Love how you formatted this!
The electrics even have poling pockets, you do not see any locomotives with those that are still in revenue freight service.
There are still plenty of old diesels on short lines, storage yards, and regional lines that were built with polling pockets
Couple hrs to the east of Iowa traction is the river port rr which has a couple of Baldwin built rsd-4 and a gp8 which has pockets
Excellent observation-- I point this out at other opportunities, and no one seems to make anything of it..
Super cool. I've talked to some old timers that remember when the Milwaukee Road was out in the Pacific Northwest and still electrified. Would like to see more Budd cars restored and used as intended or for tourist excursions throughout the country. I know there are some still in use.
As an iowan, this is awesome. Like if you agree.
It is very clean & economical....
For intensely personal reasons… thank you so much for including “The Entertainer” in this video.
Finally! A video on this from you!
... this is cool ... great video and great got see that electrified trains still in use in the Midwest ...
They will reign supreme forever.
YES!
It is actually the last fully electrified railroad in America and still very efficient still using trolley locomotives. 😊
Technically there's 2 remaining interurbans Iowa Traction and Chicago South Shore & South Bend though under Insull's ownership the South Shore could easily be confused for an electric class 1. While South Shore passenger service is 2 generations removed from the last generation of interurban cars and CSSSB freight is diesel since 82 or so it was purely interurban in the fact when the 800s ( don't call them Little Joe's around the South Shore old timers) were running freight on the main any other juice motors working the yards or other switching had to take a break because they literally could just barely handle the 800s current draw with the passenger service and any other traffic would start tripping breakers.
I came to say exactly this. The South shore doesn't do electric freight anymore, but technically it's the last interurban passenger railroad left. I cant wait for the double tracking project to be done...
@jakeweitzel6433 And the CSS&SB interurban service covers multi cities and two states. Road the vomit comet in the early 80s from Randolph Street in Chicago and would have conductor stop in Lydick IN at Quince Road.
I love the wabco aa-2s on these locomotives!
While Iowa Traction are the main electric freight carrier on the main contiguous US rail network (not counting isolated mining railroads like Deseret Power), I do believe the East Troy Electric Railroad, primarilly a heritage railway, does also carry a small amount of freight using old interurban locomotives quite similar to Iowa Traction's.
Absolutely love the music and the black and white!
Someone get these guys some more locomotives and money!
In a funny way it's both the past and the future, many of America's electric railroads dieselized around the same time our steam railroads did, and have since come to regret it. IATR have kept that spark going for a very long time, they outlived steam already, and they might just outlive diesel too.
No railroads regret switching for the most part, the expense of maintaining the wiring and power was just too much often times especially when a tiny 44-tonner could do the work for a fraction of the costs.
@@mikehawk2003 Overhead electric is only really expensive to put up, maintaining it is easy and significantly cheaper than the maintenance and fuel cost of running Diesels.
Also, In a recent press release, the IATR said they have intentions of ever dieselizing the line, so that does bode well for these old electrics.
@@Alex-RealApplebees Considering the time before the 1970's Oil Crisis, diesel fuel was unbelieveably cheap.
@@mikehawk2003 Milwaukee Road might have. They started pulling down wire when copper prices were high, copper price crashed by the time they were ready to sell, then OPEC and the oil embargo hit. They just couldn't catch a break.
Very nice catches. Love the video.
I grew up about 100 yard from the tracks in an area called Central Heights. This video brings back a lot of memories.
What an amazing railroad! Sure appreciate you braving the weather to film it for us!
Number 50 was formerly Washington and Old Dominion RR. The railroad ran in Northern Virginia from 1859 until 1968. I remember the railroad as a boy but the cabs were gone when I was born and C&O Alco's, plus some GE 44 ton and 70 ton, hauled the freight until the line closed.
There was a similar electric railway, thirty miles away in Charles City, that began around 1901. It lasted until the 1970s when it was abandoned; instead of turning it into a tourist railway. It had three interurbans, five electric freight locomotives, and three diesels. One interurban and one electric locomotive are down at Boone, Iowa and another electric is at Union, Illinois.
It’s at times like these when you realize what the internet is for
Nice video. I believe the flangers are former Milwaukee Road cars, the plow might be too. I visited the Iowa Traction earlier this year and was amazed at how many freight cars were on property, being switched or waiting their turn to be loaded.
I love the effects and music!
Now im not saying iowa has a great interurban and streetcar history, but...
ITS ELECTRIC
Boogie woogie
she's from a family full of eccentrics
they wanted to compete with the NWR by using old engines :)
Would love for you to reupload in color without the scratchy audio.
The guy just threw a traffic cone in the opening... and used it as a fricking funnel for a bag of play sand??? 🤣Amazing! ❤
You have to admit that you will NOT find a more robust funnel in any catalogue.
@@roboftherock they stay flexible and return to shape better then any other funnel.
one of my favorite videos from you . 2021 Chrysler Pacifica in 1920? lol
the company did an amazing job preserving them.
They still have journal bearings!? Wow. Well, I guess they can't operate on other rails anyway.
Glory to the interurbans
Would love to get steeplecabs like these in scale, outside of brass.
The fact that the IATR is a popular as its become and NO major manufacturer has made an prototype accurate model is wild. I do like Kato's pocket line equivalent though, Ive got several of those.
@@Alex-RealApplebeesWith Broadway stating they'd love to make electrics, but lamenting sales on the big Pennsylvania stuff, they're clearly not doing enough research.
A run of these Baldwins could cover IATR, South Shore, and Pacific Electric, plus a handful of other railroads that only had a couple. Traction modelers are probably getting at least one or two, and other modelers might grab one for a more interesting industry switcher.
Several commenters have pointed out the Chicago, South Shore & South Bend is the last electric passenger interurban. Perhaps. Although I could argue that any modern electric commuter railroad could be classified as an interurban as well.
It’s so sad how all of our interurbans have disappeared.
The South Shore Line between Chicago and South Bend is an interurban and still going very strong. The two other operational examples are SEPTA’s Norristown Line and the Skokie Valley segment of Chicago’s North Shore Line, which until 2004 had overhead wires but switched to all third rail. Beyond that are several museums around the country.
@@ChrisJones-gx7fc I knew about all of those but wouldn’t really consider them interurbans by today’s standards. SEPTA’s is by far the weirdest though.
@@HIDLad001 I could grant you the other two, but how is the South Shore not an interurban? All three are listed as interurbans on Wikipedia.
@@ChrisJones-gx7fc You’re right, the South Shore Line is a proper interurban the more that I come to think about it. But the Nippon Sharyo bilevel and single level rolling stock are pretty unusual for an interurban, and make the line feel more like commuter rail like Metra Electric, especially since the street running segment is now gone.
@@HIDLad001yes, now that street running isn't done in MC, the South Shore is basically an electrified commuter rail line.
This may sound odd, but........... May God bless the Iowa Traction Railroad!
Great episode, but the audio trying to sound old is really annoying. Far too many clicks/pops.
Sadly joke talen too far, very annoying. No idea of
I very
The goofy music made this sounds like an old Train Tsar Fun video, perhaps it's just me being silly. 🤣
Scott Joplin is “goofy”???
@@TucsonBillD Scott Joplin is certainly not 'goofy', but its use plus the false B&W images make it appear so.
@@roboftherock what makes you think that it wasn’t shot in b&w? Film is still available. And there are digital cameras that shoot b&w natively.
The best book about Iowa trolleys is "Iowa Trolleys" published by the Central Electric Railfans' Association. It has photos, rosters, history and maps.
The only transformers are where high voltage AC is rectified to 600 volt DC. You can buy a real trolley from Gomaco Trolley in Ida Grove, Iowa. Someone mentioned the Charles City Western. The wire supports from the CCW are used on the Midwest Electric at Old Threshers in Mount Pleasant, Iowa. Johnny Cash even rode the CCW one evening with the motorman. The Midwest Electric runs 5 days before Labor Day every year. It has open cars from Rio, a Peter Witt car from Milan, Italy, the last interurban to run in Iowa from the Waterloo, Cedar Falls & Northern and made by Perley Thomas (ever heard of Thomas school buses), a former Birney from Albia, Iowa converted to 4 wheel trucks from the Southern Iowa, and and interurban from the Chicago, Aurora and Elgin. There is also a work motor from the Mississippi River dam at Keokuk, Iowa.
Thanks for making this video. It's nice to see this equipment still in use. There are no transformers in the locomotives as they are DC and transformers only work with AC. The traction motors are series wound DC motors. They are used because of their high torque at low speeds. The speed is controlled by controllers with contacts that add or subtract resistors in the traction motors field circuits. The motors are in connected in series for low speeds and in parallel for higher speeds. I doubt that these are ever run in parallel as their running speeds are slow.
Even modern traction motors have plain bearings carrying them on the axles so that is not an issue but of course they could be completely different dimensions.
The locos are DC. No transformer inside. Resistors are used to vary the speed. Traction motors can be rebuilt as needed. Likely they have spares to install while defective ones are out.
Delaware-lackawanna uses Alcos from like the 50s-60s so that one is frozen in time too lol
My hometown of Mason City, Iowa
As soon as I hear 'The Entertainer', I'm thinking about watching 'The Sting'!! It is one of the best movies ever with Paul Newman and Robert Redford.
I was a snotty nosed 9 year old kid when I saw 'The Sting' at the theater for the first time.
Oh yeah, cool railroad too!!
That was pretty cool to see. Great job.
I'm not sure which unit, but one of those old steeple cabs came from my neck of the woods. It was originally owned and ran by the Youngstown and Ohio River, an interurban and coal hauler which connected Youngstown and East Liverpool, Ohio until it was abandoned in 1931.
It looks like a motorised caboose! I love it! By the way, I use my time machine every day. I have been driving the same vehicle since 1996.
Would really like to see this in color
I get new of the shelf diesel traction would be cheaper when looking for extra traction, but it feels such a waste of infrastructure to not get more electric trains.
That's pretty wild. I'll be through there this weekend, ive gone into Mason City a few times in the last couple years, but had never realized there was an active electric freight railroad there.
Liked the video except for the black and white filming.
It's lost on the fact that you see modern cars on the road.
Would hsve preferred to have seen it in color to see more detail
The straight DC traction motor will run virtually forever. It just needs rewinding every 10 years or so. The EE507 motors dating from the 1930s were only retired recently in the UK with the withdrawal of the class 442.
Depending how the green energy transition goes, maybe we could see newly-built steeplecabs returning to the rails!
The hot box joke was funny, but it's kind of depressing that you had to clarify which one you were talking about. "Taken For A Ride" is a documentary that does a great job of explaining how America became a car-centric society and why we have almost no alternatives for personal transportation in the 21st century.
The old days of Iowa Traction in Black and White but in Present Day
I remember the fire at Emory shops, in the sixties, burned some old equipment. And cashews lumber as well. We could see it from our upstairs bedroom. MCFD, CLFD VVFD, ALL WORKED IT.
There should be resistors inside the locomotive that are cut out by the control equipment as the speed of the locomotive increases. I regularly work on 1960S built electric trains that either use a camshaft arrangement to cut out the starting resistances, But as these locomotives were built in the 1920s I expect that they have a number of contactors that do this. Getting traction motors repaired is not too difficult, As there are specialist companies that undertake this work. Here in the UK a lot of the technology used on early locomotives and Electric Multiple Units is compatible with that used on ships. So the markets for these services is quite large.
Ironically these locomotives probably have a more secure source of spare parts than a locomotive built a lot later. As a big problem is nobody wants to supply what is obsolete electronic equipment. But the older systems can have electrical parts made reasonably easily. Sorry if I have used terms that are not normally used in the US. But I live in England so there might be some differences in the terminology. Thanks for posting I am have an interest in the US Inter Urban systems. Mainly as they were all early examples of electric traction.
That's OK. We speak English, here in the Colonies. Even use the English weights and measures. 🤔
Living history❤❤❤
I would love to see you talk about German Railways sometime, they are pretty insane
Outstanding. Thanks for sharing
What about the south shoreline there also a interurban
Yes, Chicago to South Bend, IN. Still running. The CSS&SB uses 1500 V DC and pantographs.
As are SEPTA’s Norristown Line and part of the North Shore Line. en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interurban
It's sad that an electrical system like this is only efficient under such special circumstances. But who knows what the future holds?
How many locomotive classes can say they've been working hard for over 100 years? I can tell you this without second thought not many.
I try to watch and oftentimes film Iowa Traction at least once a month. I want to witness, what I am able to, of the last solely electric interurban still in existence.
This video ends with an obvious invitation to go and look at the equipment on weekday mornings, then why does it begin with "All locomotives depicted in today's showing exist purely in film" which says to me, along with a black-and-white nature, that this is an outdated historical film?
The beginning text card is a nod to the famous the myth that; in the very early days of film, people once fainted/ ran out of the theatre after seeing a train come towards the camera because they thought it was real.
@@Southern_Plains_RailfanWith so many historic railroads now gone, that card "suggests" that this railroad is gone as well. Not true?
#50 was delivered to the Washington and Old Dominion railroad by Baldwin-Westinghouse in 1920
Amazing video
Who needs computers, microprocessors and other electronic devices to run a trolley locomotive? No one!
Feels like you're narrating a play through of chris sawyer's locomotion
I still want to hear his NATURAL voice. PS- I call those friction bearings, modern ones are roller bearings.
Yes, but. I'm told that the term "friction bearings" was popularized by a roller bearing manufacturer, for marketing purposes.
Yes, the correct term is "solid bearing".
If it ain't broke, don't fix it.
You cant run out of battery if you're always wired, and you dont have to fuss with emissions if you've got a motor. Is this peak locomotive design?
As long as the power company cooperates.
Get rid of the filters and this would be a great video
Is this still here?
I left my sunglasses at the buddy holly memorial
A great, individualistic survivor.
It’s the thing🔥
I used on commute on the Ft Dodge electric's years ago. On time, comfortable and terrific Motorman too.
Man, we need American electric railroads back again. It won't be electric cars nor "net zero air travel." It's electric interurban transportation. Oregon Electric was a very successful railroad but then SP&S said that electric locomotives were too expensive. Jokes on them, we now are rebuilding the whole line via trimet. AND IT IS A PAIN! Most of the old line became either private land, G&W, BNSF, Amtrak, or UP. Thanks a lot SP&S, still love you though.
Why is the video black and white? Takes away from the experience.
Pure magic. What lovely little locomotives. Is there any footage of them in colour? I'd like to model one for my model railway. Thanks again for the great footage 👍
I’m sure there’s plenty of color footage. I doubt SPR is the only one filming them, and he only did black and white for the vintage effect. There’s probably other railfan channels who have footage of these in color.
The Western Railway Museum in Suisun City, CA has one of those (GE?) electric steeplecab locomotives, #654 that ran on the Sacramento Northern interurban RR until 1965 when all electric operations ceased. #654 is a bit different in that it was outfitted with a pantograph, and one front facing trolley pole on the roof. It's a real hoot to see it in person, operating at the museum during their annual showcase event on the Memorial Day weekend.
These Iowa Traction motors are actually Baldwin-Westinghouse steeple cabs, the last operating ones.
The steeplecabs you refer to are GE 65ton Steeplecabs. The trolley pole is only used to feed air into the pantograph so it can spring up.
The motors in this video are Class-B Baldwin-Westinghouse Steeplecabs. They have about half the HP (~480) of the GE's. Sacramento Northern owned 1 of this motor (SN 440) that was leased out to the Oakland Terminal Railway until 1954.
The South Shore Line is technically an interurban.
im sure the video is nice but i cant listen to that filter over the audio
When will the FarmRail video be coming out?
No clue. I’m currently working with Farmrail to get the video approved.
@@Southern_Plains_Railfan you know, considering how this motive power is pretty ancient. It kind of makes me think of some of those pre-World War II, Lionel American, Flyer and Ives train sets, because some of those models were kind of similar to this. At the very least they’re bright colors are similar to this. In any case, it kind of makes me think of what the fictional world of one of those ancient pre-war era train layouts would be like a century later, if one wanted to portray the passage of time in one of them
I visited there couple times a year to get some videos for my UA-cam channel
8:09 sounds like wabco aa2 horn
Great Rail video...
Wish you didn't choose ragtime piano.
Can we do away with music or turn it down .great video
There isn't much to hear on interurban lines except the wheels of the consist.
That cracking vocal is really annoying , would have been cool for the intro but yeah the whole thing.