A stately parade of Burlington streamliners left Chicago each day in 1956 for the Twin Cities. At 8:45 am, the Morning Zephyr departed Union Station with the goal of arriving in St. Paul in just 6-1/4 hours, for an average … Continue reading
Category Archives: CB&Q
This timetable is pretty similar to the one from May 1955. I count 16 named trains (if the Morning Zephyr and Afternoon Zephyr are counted as two different trains) and at least 16 unnamed trains. Click image to download a … Continue reading
This timetable makes a curious change in format. As mentioned yesterday, previous timetables had devoted page 6 to condensed schedules for the California Zephyr and the Kansas City-Billings train. In all, the earlier timetables had 6-1/2 pages of condensed schedules, … Continue reading
The condensed schedules on page 5 list the Empire Builder, Western Star, Vista-Dome North Coast Limited, and Mainstreeter. It says nothing about domes on the Empire Builder even though they would be introduced on May 29, just a month after … Continue reading
Burlington’s complete system timetable for May 1955 (which will be presented here tomorrow) was 36 pages long, but this condensed version manages to fit in schedules for more than 30 trains into just four pages. The timetable also lists equipment … Continue reading
Starting with this timetable (scans for which were provided by Bryan Howell), both the Mainstreeter and Western Star were combined with the Black Hawk going in both directions between Chicago and the Twin Cities. According to John Strauss’ books, in … Continue reading
Today’s timetable has the same Chicago-Twin Cities arrangement as yesterday’s. In short, the westbound Western Star preceded the combined Mainstreeter/Black Hawk out of Chicago by 10 minutes, while the eastbound Mainstreeter followed the combined Western Star/Black Hawk out of St. … Continue reading
For this timetable, the westbound Western Star continued to run 10 minutes ahead of the combined Mainstreeter/Black Hawk. Curiously, however, eastbound it is the Mainstreeter that runs separately, with the combined Western Star/Black Hawk departing St. Paul 15 minutes ahead … Continue reading
For this timetable, the Mainstreeter was combined with the Black Hawk in both directions while the Western Star ran 30 minutes ahead of the two westbound and 10 minutes ahead eastbound. This means Burlington was running seven trains in each … Continue reading
Northern Pacific introduced the Mainstreeter on November 16, 1952. Some web sites say it was the 15th, but I’m inclined to think the 16th is correct as that coincides with the beginning date of this timetable, which is the first … Continue reading