How is this for a motive power consist? There are Alco, GE and EMD units pulling this Penn Central westbound train in Alliance in August 1972. The lead unit, PC 6300 is an Alco C628. A GE U33B is also in the motive power lineup. Of note in the background is a transfer caboose and a Burlington boxcar.
Photograph by Robert Farkas
PC F7A No. 1703 leads a train bound for Conway Yard near Pittsburgh down the Bayard Branch in Alliance in July 1972. The 1703 was built for the New York Central in May 1951. Although the scene depicts former Pennsylvania Railroad territory, the NYC had a line that passed through Alliance.
Photograph by Robert Farkas
Penn Central GP40 No. 3234 leads an eastbound train on the Fort Wayne Line in Alliance on Feb. 18, 1973. It’s a nice period piece of what the former Pennsylvania Railroad infrastructure once looked like here at this busy PRR junction. It can still at times be a busy place under Norfolk Southern ownership, but the scene is much changed.
One glance at this image and you can easily see how things have changed in Alliance over the years.
This image was made on July 9, 1972, of a westbound Penn Central train on the Fort Wayne Line. The locomotives that you see are helpers.
They include No. 4333 (EMD FP7A) and 7337 (EMD GP9). Of course just about everything you see in this scene is gone.
Alliance was a Pennsylvania Railroad town even if a branch of the New York Central passed through it.
But after the PRR and NYC merged in 1968 Alliance became purely Penn Central territory.
The image above was made early in the PC era on July 9, 1972, but traces of the predecessor roads were still around. Note the NYC boxcar in the yard behind the train.
The bottom image was made in late 1972 and shows PC 6336 and 6335 leading a southbound toward Bayard.
Conrail made changes in Alliance, but the track layout seen here is still largely in place in the Norfolk Southern era.
However, there aren’t as many weeds growing on the right of way and the brick passenger platform is not as wide.
