Here’s another classic K25 slide from that wonderfully perfect autumn day on October 14, 1988.

I’d been following Delaware & Hudson PLMT (Pittsburgh & Lake Erie-Mount Tom) unit coal train that was rolling east on Conrail’s Southern Tier (former Erie Railroad) main line.

The old Cass Street Tower had controlled the Junction where the original Erie Maine Line that went west via Andover, New York diverged from Erie’s Buffalo Line that went via River Junction and Attica, New York. By 1988, the Buffalo Line was the preferred route for most freights.

Delaware & Hudson had trackage rights on Conrail between Buffalo and Binghamton, NY. By mid-1988, Guilford Transportation Industries had relinquished control of the D&H, and New York, Susquehanna & Western was the court appointed operator of the line.

NY&W had acquired a fleet of former Burlington Northern SD45/F45s that it assigned to road freights.

I was fan of the SD45, and when I caught this coal train slogging east on the old Erie, I did my best to keep up with it, making photographs with my old Leica M2 along the way. This view at Cass Street was one of just 16 places I photographed the train that morning.

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