Happy 50th Anniversary, Amtrak!

Fifty years to the day from the first run of Amtrak train 18, the eastbound Super-Chief-El Capitan, its 2021 version, train 4 Sou... (more)

Amtrak’s eastbound Southwest Chief flies over a fill along a trackside pond west of Leeds, Illinois, on May 9, 1992. Powering train 4 is a pair of new GE B32BWH locomotives bracketing an older EMD... (more)

Amtrak’s Phase I Heritage engine, P42DC 156, was painted to celebrate the carrier’s 40th Anniversary in 2011. After departing Los Angeles, AMTK 156, leading train 4, the now tri-weekly Southwe... (more)

Amtrak Train #4, the Southwest Chief is seen accelerating off the high desert and through West Winslow as the sun begins to rise. The phase 1 heritage unit #156 is leading the train. The 12,633 f... (more)

The Last Daily Chief

October 11, 2020, was the final day for daily service for Amtrak’s long-distance trains, such as train 4, the eastbound Southwest Chief, as it make... (more)

The Eastbound Southwest Chief is seen departing Winslow on a picture-perfect Arizona morning. One of the hundred or so BNSF freight trains that pass through town is seen holding waiting for The Ch... (more)

It is sunset, both literally and figuratively, for Amtrak’s long-distance trains, as on October 12, 2020, Amtrak’s Southwest Chief, San Francisco Zephyr, Empire Builder and more)

Amtrak’s Southwest Chief, has operated as a daily train for nearly 50 years (although not always with that name, as it was originally the Southwest Limited). That ends in a couple o... (more)

Amtrak #4 'The Southwest Chief' speeds past the east end of Wagon Mound while a BNSF tie train waits in the hole

Amtrak's eastbound Southwest Chief makes an on-time appearance through Chapelle, New Mexico, as it splits through the classic ATSF semaphore signals.

AMTK 167 leads the Chicago bound train up track 3 in Cajon Pass as night overtakes day.

Amtrak 75 reverses the Chief's trainset through the wash rack in Chicago.

Amtrak's train 4, the eastbound Southwest Chief, departed Gallup, New Mexico, 42 minutes late on the morning of August 15th, 2015. One of the carrier's specially painted 40th Anniversary engines, ... (more)

The Southwest Chief arrives in Naperville with fewer cars than normal due to the ongoing pandemic which has greatly reduced the need to take the train these days...