Amtrak Empire Builder compilation with private cars and much more!

Canal St. Grade crossing just outside Chicago Union Station is the last and first grade crossing for the Amtrak Empire Builder's journey. There is quite a few Empire Builders with cool and interesting consists from time to time, mainly hoards of private cars. I got a lot of heads up from Sethamtrak about them, and headed down to Canal St. grade crossing to catch them, late or on time, dark or day. There is a total of 6 Empire Builders (EB) in this video. The only catch that wasn't filmed at Canal St. grade crossing was only because I couldn't get to it fast enough, so I shot from Randolph St. bridge just 3 blocks away, but still would be part of this compilation.

The first Empire Builder was a standard consist with 5 private cars on the end. The sunlight wasn't favorable, but 5 private cars is not too common, usually its 3 or less.

The second EB was really cool, and had a horn friendly engineer as well. An FRA inspection car was right behind the P42s, and on the end 3 Iowa Pacific cars.

The third EB was from Randolph St. bridge, a standard consist with a single private car on the end in transfer for the AAPRCO Pine Tree Limited. That day I was heading to Canal St. to catch the EB, but when I was almost there walking North, I saw it crossing Canal St. and had to run to Randolph bridge instead to catch it.

The fourth EB had a BNSF Dash9-44CW on the point paired up with one P42, and a standard consist. Amtrak will occasionally use BNSF power (usually GE locos), from Warbonnets to generic Gevos to replace an Amtrak loco that has either broken down or to be in place of an Amtrak loco because of power shortage. Sometimes when a major incident happens, such as a car/human collison somewhere on the EB route, BNSF power will also be thrown on the point. I'm not sure what their logic is of putting a freight loco with a different gearing ratio than an Amtrak loco together.

The fifth EB had a standard consist with 3 Milwaukee Road private cars in transfer coming from the Milwaukee Road 261 excursion in Minnesota. Note the Metra F40PH that pulls out and stops, this was unexpected but worked out well. It was making a switching movement on the Ogilvie Transportation Center tracks, or the station leads that serve the Metra UP West, Northwest, and North lines.

The sixth EB was awesome, it has an Amtrak Cascades F40PH NPCU in tow, that would end up in Beech Grove eventually for repairs, and a single private car at the end. A notable Superliner 1 with a name was also in the consist as well as I luckily spotted that with my awesome railfanning skillz. Thunderdog7311 on Youtube was there to catch this EB with me on a very unexpected notice as I was chased violently when he got there with his bros. :P

Thanks for watching!