One of railroading’s worst kept secrets is now official.
Canadian National on Tuesday announced that it will operate a small fleet of locomotives in the liveries of some of its predecessor railroads in observation of its 25th anniversary of transitioning from a government-owned Crown Corporation to a private entity.
The locomotives wear liveries of the Illinois Central; Wisconsin Central; Elgin, Joliet & Eastern; BC Rail and Grand Trunk Western.
CN issues an initial public stock offering o n Nov. 17, 1995.
“The privatization of CN was anticipated with widespread skepticism, but executed with startling success and today it is the source of enormous pride for our employees and all those involved over the years,” said CN CEO J.J. Ruest said in a statement.
“It allowed CN to unleash the powerful creative and competitive forces of our railroaders. I want to thank everyone who contributed to this success as well as our employees for their dedication to safely moving the economy for our customers and for the communities where we operate.”
The first CN train led by one of the heritage units left Toronto’s Macmillan Yard on Sunday with ET44AC No. 3115 in the BC Rail red, white, and blue “hockey stick” livery.
Other CN heritage units include Grand Trunk (No. 8952); Elgin, Joliet & Eastern (3023), Wisconsin Central (3069), and Illinois Central (3008).
A GP40-3 and slug sethas been repainted in the pre-1961 CN green and gold livery.
Tags: Canadian National, CN locomotives, CN motive power, Heritage locomotives, Jean-Jacques Ruest
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