Keepin' it Real

I was thinking back tonight about the session that we just completed on December 18, 2010, on the CR&E.  More specifically I was thinking about some actions of the crew members that made the model trains we were running seem a bit more like the real thing. 

One thing I'm very much a fan of in operating sessions is slowing things down.  There's no need to race across the railroad with a train, quickly completing switching moves so you can be rushed to your next assignment.  Real railroaders take time, sometimes a lot of time, to perform their duties.  If our desire is to emulate those duties, we should take some extra time too.

Let me just say that I noticed almost everyone, if not everyone, performing their jobs in a very realistic manner on Saturday.  I was very pleased with the way the crew took things to a higher level of realism.  Tonight I was thinking specifically about one episode, so I'll share that now.

I had assigned Jeff Lindstrom to K&N District mine run C76 rather early in the session. His job was to take a pair of six-axle units from the diesel shop at Lewisburg over to Meadow Bluff, where he'd pick up some hoppers to spot at the Crawley loadout just north of Meadow Bluff.  After spotting Crawley, a restricted-speed shove move up the K&N with the conductor and brakeman hanging off the last hopper, Jeff took C76's units to the Cleark Fork Branch where they would pick up a unit train of loaded Top Gons. 

I caught up to Jeff later when he had coupled on to the train of Top Gons and pulled it toward the connection of the south leg of the wye at Kessler with the mainline at Kessler.  He was stopped at the junction so a crew member could climb off the locomotive and line the switch for movement off the branch and also double-check the alignment of the passing siding switch for mainline movement.  After a short pause, the loaded train was crawling off the branch and the rear car finally cleared the junction switch.  C76 stopped again, this time to allow the crew member to line the turnout back for the mainline.

During the course of an operating session, I'm pretty busy.  I stepped away from this action for awhile and came back a few minutes later to see Jeff and his C76 still stopped south of the connection switch.  The train hadn't turned a wheel since I left them a short time before.   I asked Jeff, "Everything okay?" 

"Well, you didn't give us a caboose so my conductor is having to walk all the way back to the head end now."

Excellent!  Not only had Jeff listened to some of the coaching I had given crews before the session about stopping to line hand-throw turnouts, he had actually thought about where his conductor was and where his conductor needed to go before the train could move again.  That's exactly the type of thinking I would like the operating crew members to do when they are executing their duties. 

Finally, after a precarious walk that included walking across two bridges, C76 became C77 and was headed back south.

And with that, the Red Shirt Rookie, as he likes to refer to himself, stepped up to another level.   Well done, Mr. Lindstrom!