After looking through all sorts of picture archives of some BNSF loco's I realized they end at 9999. Are loco's prohibited from using 5 digits? Is it law? It seems to me that there could/would be a need to go into the 10,000's.
Can't speak to other railroads, but FNM (NdeM) here in Mexico certainly had locos numbered into the 10,000's. Here I am on one at Oaxaca a couple of years ago. Regards Ed
There really isn't a need to since railroads have the use of multiple reporting marks. There could just as easily be a BNSF 1069, ATSF 1069, and BN 1069. People would argue that is unduly confusing but there are already lease units running around with the same number as the host road's engines (CSXT 4260 and HLCX 4260, etc.) without a problem. Not to mention with all the power sharing that goes on what's to keep NS 9999 and BNSF 9999 from being on the same train? (Other than cab signals east of Cleveland, but that's another thread entirely.) Union Pacific even has already begun to implement this with their use of the UPY reporting marks for yard and local power.
Crews down here that I have run into have been exceptionally friendly. The private security guards, with a few notable exceptions, are the same @#*$$!'s as anywhere else. Although I suppose, in all fairness, that they are just executing the orders from railroad management. Regards Ed
Reminds me of a picture I took many years ago at Bellevue, OH of 2 units coupled together, both numbered 2453. One was N&W and the other UP.
Prior to 1920, when there was a Pennsylvania Railroad East of Pittsburgh and a separate Pennsylvania Lines West of Pittsburgh, Lines West numbered locomotives removed from the scrap line and returned to service for World War I in the 10000 series. PRR itself used 10000 series for experimental electric locomotives. Currently, the UMLER regulations specify no more than four alpha and six numeric for any railroad equipment. Many railroads number all freight equipment with five or more digits and locomotive with four or fewer to permit computers to easily differentiate between the two. :cat:
According to an old post on here, in 1982 the N&W roster had: 2403-2447 EMD GP7 2448-2534 EMD GP9 Regards Ed
5-digit loco numbers existed in the US and possibly Canada before UMLER. Anyway, why are they needed? Even the largest railroads don't have 10,000 engines.
Railroads reach 5 digit numbers when they assign different blocks of numbers to classes of locomotives. They don't number their aquisitions totally sequentially (within a class, yes, but not across the board). So it can easily pass that they assign blocks of maybe a few hundred numbers to a class where they only wind up buying a few locos. Adds up if you have a lot of different locos, a long history, and if you never went back to renumber classes or use the open spaces. Regards Ed
