Modern Commuter Service - 2
2
Provo metropolitan areas. FrontRunner operates on a portion
of the right-of-way of the Utah Central Railroad, built in 1869
to connect the first transcontinental railroad with Salt Lake
City. Most of the single-track railroad is separate from the UP,
except for about six miles of shared track north of Ogden. Of
course, your version could include more shared trackage. The
railroad has operated MP36PH-3C locomotives and hi-level
Bombardier cab cars and coaches, supplemented by additional
Comet Coaches acquired used from New Jersey Transit.
A larger example of commuter rail operations is the for-
mer Southern Pacific commuter service in and around San
Francisco. SP once operated over the same rails, with Fairbanks
Morse locomotives and a variety of classic equipment. Today,
2: Both running in reverse, a pair of VRE consists dem-
onstrate a variety of equipment and paint schemes,
available from Wheels of Time and Kato.
Caltrain operates
almost 100 trains a
day with a mixture
of Bombardier and
Nippon coaches, and
EMD and MPI loco-
motives. Some of
the coaches were
purchased from the
Seattle “Sounder”
fleet, an example
of the prototype’s
exchange of equipment
as needs vary.
A “local” example
There are two fleets of
commuter rail opera-
tions in my hometown
area of Washington DC;
Maryland Area Regional Commuter (MARC), and Virginia Rail
express (VRE).
MARC operates on some of the oldest right-of-way in the coun-
try, including from Baltimore to Ellicott City, MD. The former
Baltimore and Ohio trackage supports service from Baltimore
to Washington on three lines connecting the two cities with
stations as far west as Harper’s Ferry, MD. One of the lines
shares northeast corridor rails with AMTRAK and uses electric
locomotives. The other two use diesels and a variety of con-
ventional and bi-level equipment.
VRE provides service from downtown Washington to
the Virginia suburbs. There are two lines – one south to
3
3: A prototype VRE train
departs Alexandria station on
rails shared with Amtrak, CSX
and NS.
MRH-Feb 2014
