67 years young. PNWR 1852, SP 4397 in a past life, shuffles freight cars at the Albany "OE Yard" on a cold but sunny winter day. This locomotive, along with PNWR's other first generation diesels, is on the chopping block with replacements supposedly coming soon, though it seems the details are yet to be finalized. Sister railroads Willamette & Pacific/Portland & Western started their fleet with a vast array of first & second generation EMDs, but over the years as locomotives broke, were wrecked, or were simply sold off, the number of first gens dwindled and nowadays only 1501, 1801, 1852 and 1854 remain. I personally hope to see one of the cadillacs preserved, seeing as SP's SD9s were ubiquitous power on SP's Oregon branches for decades.
