I have been a railroad enthusiast all my life. Railroads offer everything that make photography worthwhile - shapes, color, light, line, form, landscape. As often as possible, I put people in my pictures to vary their scope.
A slick-looking caboose (which no longer are even used on railroads) and a Norfolk Southern high-hood GP9 (black with stripes, for parts) wait at Canaan, Connecticut in the Housatonic Railroad yard. The Hoosy is a branch line operating in Western Massachusetts and Northwestern Connecticut. It hauls about 150 cars a week.
Here's a line of gondola cars (pronounced gon-DOH-lah) heading eastbound on a CSX manifest freight train at Canaan, New York on the Albany-Boston line. I like the picture's contrasting forms and light. It's a cold March day, but Spring is just around the corner.
A hard-working trainman on the New England Central rides a set of tank cars across the CSX diamond at Palmer, Massachusetts. Just behind where I'm standing is a famous station designed by the architect HH Richardson, which today is being rehabilitated as a restaurant/hotel called The Steaming Tender. You can google it for more information.
This is one of my favorite pictures. It shows the gritty, workaday side of railroading. A CSX hotshot train with GE locomotives on the point barrels through the heart of Chatham, New York heading for Boston on a rainy Spring day. The trains are part of the rhythm of the life of many towns, regularly stopping traffic for a minute or two at a time. And then life resumes.
A pair of Guilford Transportation locomotives wait on the bridge at North Adams, Massachusetts. Guilford, which is now called Pan Am, is the old Boston & Maine, and traverses Northern Massachusetts through the famous Hoosac Tunnel just east of town. The tunnel, one of the longest in the world, took 24 years to dig out. Railroading has so much history attached to it.
Track worker uses fire to heat the rails to realign them after maintenance. Railroading is a constant struggle against the ravages of nature and heavy trains wearing down the tracks. The average main-line locomotive today weighs 200 tons. The average rail car loaded weighs 80 tons, although coal cars can weigh 150 tons apiece.
A westbound CSX freight passes a track inspection truck on a bright April day. I like the bright color and shiny surfaces in this picture. Look at all the lights... headlights, ditch lights, rooftop strobes.