Screenshot of The Week: May 1 to May 8 2016 (Rival Railroads)

Greetings.

Back in the golden age of steam on both sides of the pond, the myriad of railroads were often locked in fierce competition. For example, one consequence of this was trains racing alongside each other for miles with their routes crossing at times. This week's theme is Rival Railroads. Please send your theme suggestions for subsequent competitions via email or Skype by clicking on the little icons below my username.

One screenshot allowed per entrant. Screenshots must adhere to the theme and the Trainz Forum Code of Conduct.

Submission closes on May 8 at 12:00 noon UTC/GMT/Zulu time.

Cheerio,
Nicholas

The Colusa & Lake's owners had a dislike of almost any paths outside their own. This included popular trade through Williams, CA, and the CP/SP-owned Northern Railway. Their animosity extended well into trade - the C&L refused to build into Williams despite numerous financial benefits and ferried new rolling stock up the Sacramento River rather than pay less to get it on the NRy. Here, No. 3 waits impatiently as a mixed freight crosses the main line. As much as they hate the idea, operating procedures must be obeyed. Therefore, as both lines are dark, all C&L trains have to stop before crossing, and yield right-of-way to the standard gauge.

The Race


The two engineers whip their iron steeds as their trains sprint through the South Chicago suburbs. The Windy City skyline fades away into the mist as the two streamliners begin their nightly dash towards Gotham.



According to accounts from PRR and NYC engineers alike, the K4s were better at starting the Broadway Limited than the J3s were at starting up the 20th Century Limited. The boosters on the Hudsons helped, but countering that advantage was the fact that the Century regularly sold out it's 15 car consist, and thus generally ran in two sections. The Broadway routinely ran with ten or less cars, which were rarely full. During the war, two K4s could regularly be seen double heading a sold out 15 car Broadway. Eventually, the rivalry between the K4 Pacific and the J3a Hudson was eclipsed by the similar postwar competition between the New York Central's 4-8-4 Niagaras and the Pennsy's 4-4-4-4 T-1 Duplexes. In only a few short years, the Century would be dieselized, followed shortly by the Broadway. Sleek E7s and E8s plied the rails for the next two and a half decades, until the merger era commenced with the creation of Penn Central.

The race is now but a distant memory, and due to consolidation under Penn Central, and later Conrail, the redundancies have been addressed. Where there were once eight mainline tracks, now stand only two, and where the thunderous roar of these sleek iron horses roamed free, remains the memory of a bygone era.

Speaking of streamliners.



Dave

SLRR and CN have been rivals in this area for years now...
SLRR Grain train makes a run past a slow moving CN Intermodal.



Cheers,
SM

The Southern Pacific and the Santa Fe rivaled to serve the South West and California for nearly 100 years. In the Tehachapi Mountains, the two shared common trackage. Here we see the Santa Fe's San Francisco Chief headed uphill towards the horseshoe curves at Caliente while a Southern Pacific freight drifts down grade towards Bakersfield.

At Flatonia, TX, a BNSF grain train awaits a Union Pacific oil train to pass through the interlocker.

SDJR (& GWR) Highbridge

In the mid nineteenth century two overarching and rival railway systems, consisting of a number of associated smaller railway companies and with incompatible gauges were competing for mileage in the south-west of England: Brunel's Great Western Railway (GWR) with its 7ft 1/4in (2,140mm) broad gauge and the London and Southern Railway (LSWR) using Stephenson's 4ft 8 1/2in (1,435mm, later standard) gauge.


For various reasons the Somerset Central Railway (SCR) had to go with the broad gauge, whereas the Dorset Central Railway went with, what we now know as, standard gauge. These two railways came together in both philosophy and physically in order to create a rail link from the Bristol Channel (and by ship from South Wales) to the English Channel (and by ship to France) as well as by LSWR metals back to London. In order to create the, now famous, Somerset and Dorset Railway (S&D), they clearly needed to standardise gauges. Brunel had held onto to his pet broad gauge well past rationality and when the SCR changed gauges AND linked to with the DCR to its rival, the LSWR, he saw it as treachery of the worst kind. This set the course for a bitter rivalry that lasted through the times when GWR did adopt standard gauge, into to 1923 Grouping (when the LSWR became part of the Southern Railway) and even on past 1948, when the nationalised British Railways was formed. In British Railways days, the Somerset & Dorset Joint Railway (SDJR as it had become) was sometimes part of BR's Southern Region and at other times was part of (what workers still considered the "rival" BR Western Region - the descendant of the GWR).


The screenshot shows Highbridge as it might have been before 1930. SDJR Highbridge Wharf, SDJR Burnham Pier and the Bristol Channel are behind us, where the SDJR passenger train has just come from, crossing the GWR mainline to Taunton, Exeter, and Penzance to top right. SDJR Highbridge station is at top centre and Highbridge Works (where SDJR locos, carriages and goods stock were made and then maintained until the 1930s) is at top of picture.


Peter.

Trainboi1
judahGrice

Jacksonbarrno
Trainboi1

Trainboi1
stevelerro

stevelerro
peterwise

stevelerro
jacksonbarno

stevelerro
trainboi1

peterwise
trainboi1

Voting is now closed, thank you all for participating.

4 trainboi1
4 stevelerro
2 jacksonbarno
2 peterwise

Cheerio,
Nicholas