Big Boy will be in Houston 8/17/21

[hindesky]

 

https://www.houstonchronicle.com/news/houston-texas/transportation/article/Big-Boy-is-back-world-s-largest-steam-engine-16385994.php

Big Boy is coming back, but unlike a lot of Houston folks in the past 18 months, he has not packed on additional weight — still tipping the scales at 1.2 million pounds.

Union Pacific Railroad’s only operational steam locomotive of its kind, Unit 4014, AKA Big Boy, chuffed into Texas midday Friday. The train will spend most of the weekend in north Texas before heading south Sunday and hitting the railroad’s Hearne yard near College Station Sunday evening.

Monday, Big Boy will make its way from Hearne to Houston, with its arrival expected around 4 p.m. at the downtown Amtrak station near Interstate 45 and Washington Avenue. Public display of the train in Houston officially will be from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. Tuesday, though Biggie will not pull out until Wednesday morning.

The last time 4014 found its way to Houston in November 2019, thousands lined the tracks and tromped along its massive steam boilers to get a look.

“I feel like you might get that many again,” said Rainey Webster, executive director of the Rosenberg Rail Museum. “There are a lot of groups, and there’s fan groups for the Big Boy.”

Because viewing is outdoors, Webster said she is confident COVID will not keep many fans away.

Big Boy is one of 25 locomotives built specifically for mountain passes in Utah and Wyoming in the early 1940s. Only eight remain assembled and Big Boy — acquired from a California rail museum and restored from 2013 to 2019 — is the only one still running along the rails.

“It really is a piece of history,” said rail enthusiast Todd Davis, 60, of Houston, noting the role trains played in making America a manufacturing powerhouse.

Davis, who photographed the train on its last tour, said he plans to head downtown Tuesday morning, hoping to get in and out quickly.

Union Pacific engine 4014, aka the Big Boy, sits at the Amtrak station on Nov. 6, 2019, in Houston. Hundreds came to see the train.

Jon Shapley, Houston Chronicle / Staff photographer

The massive machines are built in a special 4-8-8-4 trainset where the enormous boiler powers four wheels in the front, hinged to two sets of eight wheels in the center, with another four wheels hinged on the back. The hinges allowed for the massive trains to maneuver curves in the tracks.

Fort Worth and Houston are the only spots in Texas where the train will be on display and available for public tours. At other locations, depending on access, people can see but not get close to the train.

Houston, once billed as the place where 17 railroads meet the sea, has deep ties to steam engines, so much so there is one on the city’s seal. Lately, however, some residents have chafed at trains chugging through the neighborhoods as heavy freight volumes have led Union Pacific to slow or stop trains, particularly in the East End, Second Ward and Fifth Ward.

Though the problem has improved since a May meeting with Congresswoman Sylvia Garcia, community groups and Union Pacific — some residents have said more effort is needed to ease gridlock at blocked crossings.

Barring something unexpected, Big Boy is not likely to block anyone, as rail traffic usually is timed to stay out of its way.

With its attached coal car, Big Boy is a foot taller and 60 feet longer than Union Pacific’s typical diesel locomotive. The boiler alone is nearly nine feet in diameter, making Big Boy the largest steam engine in the world.

Its route through the Houston area, however, differs from its 2019 trip, dashing the hopes of some fans. In 2019, Big Boy came into Houston from the west via San Antonio, using UP lines parallel to U.S. 90 Alternate through East Bernard and Rosenberg and southwest Houston. This time, the train will travel from the northwest from Hearne, Hempstead and along U.S. 290 and Washington Ave.

“When I heard it was coming I got so excited, then I looked and saw it wasn’t coming our way,” Webster said.

“It was like salt in the wound,” she joked.

Hopefully, she added, other historic trains can find new options soon in Rosenberg, where museum officials are planning a capital campaign to add a rail spur on the two-acre site where trains can pull off the main tracks and hang around for a few hours or days. Work on fundraising is just starting, Webster said.

“We’re really excited to welcome them,” she said. “Maybe next time Big Boy can stop.”

 

Ken Ellis/Staff

dug.begley@chron.com

Edited August 14, 2021 by hindesky

[Tumbleweed_Tx]

nice

[august948]

Now THAT'S an engine.

[hindesky]

Track Big Boy's location.

https://www.up.com/forms/steam-trace.cfm

Edited August 16, 2021 by hindesky

[hindesky]

Caught it at the Harvard St crossing at Hicks St. Quite a few people showed up to see it. Once it passed I tried to go to the Amtrak station but it was packed and it started raining with lots of lightning. It had the engine, a tender, 2 water tank cars for the steam, then a modern engine, several old box cars and then a bunch of old passenger cars.

 

 

 

 

Edited August 17, 2021 by hindesky

[mkultra25]

My wife took a group of folks to the Amtrak station this morning to see it and said there was quite a large crowd. Almost an hour wait to board the museum car exhibit, and people were apparently having to park as far away as the Walgreens at Studemont and Washington. She saw EMS treating several people for heat-related illness. 

I was going to take the light rail down to the Preston station and walk over, but woke up today feeling under the weather and reconsidered.