Hello everyone. On MLK Day 2024, I returned to the Fostoria Iron Triangle Railpark for the second day of two days at the Iron Triangle. The traffic was a bit better than the day before, thanks to more action on the NS Fostoria District. The day itself was a pretty decent one all around minus the weather, especially with the traffic on CSX.
The day started off with some MACtion with a single SD70MAC leading CSX train M506 to Walbridge. Today's M506 featured a handful of old-school auto-parts boxcars, including a pair of old Conrail boxcars. After M506 passed through, the next two hours was all CSX. A baretable train and manifest trains M558 and M559 (the two Cleveland-to-Cincinnati manifest trains) passed by, and M558 featured another classic fallen flag car; a Norfolk and Western bay hopper car. These classic N&W covered hoppers are slowly fading from the rails, so get them while you can. M201, the daily Walbridge to Chicago manifest train, made an uncommon daytime about 15 minutes later. M201 typically does not run during the day while its counterpart (M200) typically runs in daytime.
After the westbound CSX coke express passed by, Norfolk Southern finally joined in on the action. Intermodal 28N, the most consistent train on the Fostoria District, passed through around 10:30 AM and NS followed up 28N with a westbound grain train and the daily steel local out to Leipsic. The catch of the day for CSX soon rolled by on their most consistent train (I010) on the Willard Subdivision, the Georgia Road Emblem Unit serving as the rear DPU. The Georgia Road Emblem Unit (CSX 3415) is my first CSX emblem unit I have seen in the year 2024 and the first one that I have seen since catching the Clinchfield Emblem Unit back in August 2023 in Kenova, West Virginia. CSX followed up I010 with intermodal I150 to Detroit, manifest M560 to Selkirk, and manifest M630 heading from Indianapolis on up to Walbridge. CSX re-instated M630 late last year after it split up I131/I132 intermodal and manifest combo train that it ran between Walbridge to Indianapolis. Today's M630 was noticeably short with a number of boxcars, including a Wisconsin Central boxcar near the end of the train.
The afternoon portion of the day kicked off with the second-best catch of the day of two SD70 Flared-Macs leading a baretable train east. the CSX Flared-Macs have made a comeback on the railroad as CSX has finally gotten around to rebuilding a good portion of them and bringing them back to full service. While this is a positive, one downside of Flared Mac restoration is the near-certain end of the Dash 8 action on CSX. Thanks to the Mac restoration project, Dash 8's have returned to storage and/or retirement, so this is a blessing and a curse in many ways. The parade of trains continued with four manifest trains; NS 14Q and 15Q, CSX M510 to Detroit, and M567 also to Detroit. Today's M510 was noticeably longer than it usually is, so long it even featured a mid-train DPU and a GP38-2 riding along with the DPU. 14Q and 15Q, as well as M567, featured the typical consists one can expect to see on their respected trains, though 15Q did feature an SD70ACu.
The remainder of the day saw some of the typical action an afternoon in Fostoria would consist of; the daily steel special returning for Norfolk Southern, a pair of westbound intermodal trains on CSX, eastbound manifest M370, and finally new NS intermodal train 270 to Columbus. Late last year, NS created NS trains 270 and 271 to accommodate growing intermodal traffic in Columbus, and in doing so re-routed trains 276 and 277 up to the Chicago Line instead of the Fostoria District. As one can tell, NS has made some changes to the Fostoria District and it sadly has seen a temporary decrease in action. Hopefully traffic will recover on the old NKP mainline later on in the year, but only time will tell.
Overall, it was a rather decent day of railfanning between the Georgia Road Emblem Unit, fallen flag rolling stock action, and MACtion on CSX. I plan on making a return to the Iron Triangle later on in the year after visiting a few other places first. Here's to hoping for more good days of railfanning ahead at this iconic railfanning location.
Thanks for watching, and I hope you enjoy the video!
-N&W475.