Lex Anteinternet: Subscribe by email "gadget" going away.

Lex Anteinternet: Subscribe by email "gadget" going away.: Google seems pretty intent on destroying the Blogger format, which means that for people like me, who have blogged on blogger, we have a cho...

Lex Anteinternet: April 12, 1921 International hands off, and hands...

Lex Anteinternet: April 12, 1921 International hands off, and hands...:    This railroad disaster was photographed in Alaska:

Amtrak Expansion. Cheyenne to Denver, and beyond!?

I have real problems, I'll admit, with the scope of the proposed infrastructure spending proposals that President Biden is looking at, but if they go forward, I really hope we do see rail service restored (and that's what it would be) between Cheyenne and Denver.

The plan proposes to invest $80B in Amtrak.  Yes, $80B.  Most of that will go to repairs, believe it or not, as the Amtrak has never been a favorite of the Republican Party, which in its heard of hearts feels that the quasi public rail line is simply a way of preserving an obsolete mode of transportation at the Government's expense.  But rail has been receiving a lot of attention recently for a variety of reasons, not the least of which is that in a now carbon conscious era, it's the greenest mode of transportation taht we have, something the commercial rail lines have been emphasizing.

Indeed, if the American public wasn't afraid of a nuclear power the same way that four year olds are afraid of monsters that live under their beds, it could be greener yet, and there's some talk of now supporting nuclear power among serious informed environmentalists.  A campaign to push that, called the Solutionary Rail, is now active.  We'll deal with that some other time.

Here we're noting that we're hopeful that if this does go through, and as noted we have real reservations about this level of expenditure, that Amtrak does put in a passenger line from Cheyenne to Pueblo.  

A line connecting Ft. Collins to Denver has been a proposal in Colorado for quite a while and has some backing there.  The same line of thought has already included Cheyenne.  This has a lot to do with trying to ease the burgeoning traffic problem this area experiences due to the massive population growth in Colorado.  Wyomingites, I suppose, should therefore approach this with some caution as it would tie us into the Front Range communities in a way that we might not want to be.  Still, it's an interesting idea.

It's one that for some reason I think will fall through, and I also suspect it'll receive no support in Wyoming. Still, it's interesting.

Smoking like one of the old ones. Union Pacific pusher engine, Medicine Bow, Wyoming.

 

Lex Anteinternet: March 24, 1941. The "Wild West Cowboys"

Lex Anteinternet: March 24, 1941. Reversal of fortunes in North Afr...: 

The last of New York's "Wild West Cowboys", mounted men who rode in front of the city's urban freight trains in Manhattan to clear pedestrians, made his last ride. After this date, the mounted riders were retired from that service, there being at that time only one left.

Railhead: Retired steam engine, Rawlins Wyoming

Railhead: Retired steam engine, Rawlins Wyoming: An old thread updated.

Blog Mirror: Virtual Railfan

 Virtual Railfan

Lex Anteinternet: November 23, 1920. Empires

Lex Anteinternet: November 23, 1920. Empires: 

November 23, 1920. Empires

* * *

Anchorage Alaska, which had been founded in 1915, was incorporated.

Anchorage was, and is, as the name indicates a port city.  And today its a large one, much like any other large port city, all of which have a certain universal character.  It was also, however, right from the onset a railhead, which made it all the more important.

Lex Anteinternet: October 5, 1920. World Series begins, Russo Polish War ends, Railway reopens

Lex Anteinternet: October 5, 1920. World Series begins, Russo Polis...: 

October 5, 1920. World Series begins, Russo Polish War ends, Railways reopen.

 The 1920 World Series started on this day, in 1920.

Crowd in Ebbets Field.

Cleveland won the first game, 1 to 0.

New York City Mayor John Hylan throws ball to open World Series at Ebbets Field

Poland and the Soviet Union signed an armistice to end the fighting between their countries.  Fighting would stop on October 18.

In Egypt, the American University in Cairo opened.

Elsewhere in the Middle East, a new railroad opened up.  Or rather a rebuilt raiilway.

The opening of the Jaffa-Jerusalem Railway was attended, as all such things were, by the senior British official.

The line had originally been a narrow gauge railway, but  the British reconstructed it to a new, more useful, wider gauge.

While it has been closed from time to time, updates and reconstructions have meant that the rail line remains in use today.

Derailed Union Pacific Grain (corn) train, Bosler Wyoming. August 22, 2020.