If you hang out in Olmsted Falls or Berea in the afternoon, chances are you’re going to see the Norfolk Southern rain L13. Sure, there is a fleet of other regularly scheduled trains that you can count on seeing during the afternoon hours, but those are primarily intermodal trains with fairly standard consists.
The L13 is a Bellevue to Rockport Yard turn. It typically arrives in Cleveland in late afternoon and departs in early evening. During the summer months you can catch it going both directions in daylight.
On occasion the crew will run out of time and the L13 won’t return to Bellevue until the next morning.
The consist of the L13 can vary widely. I’ve seen it running light and I’ve seen it with enough cars to appear to be a regular manifest freight.
For a good part of this year, the L13 had one or more “triclops” units for power. Those are SD60M units that were built for Burlington Northern and feature a unique looking three-piece windshield.
The rendition of L13 shown here doesn’t have triclops in the motive power consist, but it does seem to nearly as many locomotives as freight cars. Some of the units may might be being ferried to Rockport for assignment.
Tags: Norfolk Southern, NS Chicago Line, NS in Olmsted Falls, NS L13, NS locomotives, NS motive power, Olmsted Falls Ohio
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December 12, 2017 at 12:11 am |
You can catch L13 3 or 4 times just sitting in Berea in 1 hour, L13 usually between 3PM and 8PM in Berea.