DPU - coal vs freight (thru Thomasville, NC)

1611mac

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Watching Thomasville, NC live cam (virtualrailfan.com) I see that DPU's are on the backend of coal trains but in the center of mixed freight. Anyone have ideas why that might be?
 
Watching Thomasville, NC live cam (virtualrailfan.com) I see that DPU's are on the backend of coal trains but in the center of mixed freight. Anyone have ideas why that might be?

The weight of the train probably. General goods in a mixed freight are a lot lighter than coal. Then again I have seen DPUs in the middle and at the end on coal trains coming out of the Powder River Basin. The length of some of these trains maybe part of the reason as they were quite long and the terrain isn't as flat as we think even when rolling across the Midwest sot there are probably a lot of reasons for this.
 
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