Why Locomotive Numbers Are Important

An often-asked question is about the large numbers on locomotives. Are those the train numbers? Why are they all over the engine? Why are they so big. Here's what I found out.

[karenebarker]

I was telling my grown son that I dearly love trains. Something he didn't know about me🙂 He pulls out his phone and says, " you need to follow Distant Signal" So I pull out my phone and show him my subscription to your channel. Nice laugh between us and we have a new topic to chat about. Love having my grown sons as my friends too!

[kingjames]

I don't come here to watch trains, I come to hear Danny talk. Danny Harmon and Mike Rowe, two of the best and most recognizable voices in broadcasting.

[brvfd]

A mid day, mid week posting by the best rail enthusiast ever… My day has been made!

[AbelG]

There is a UP 4555, a BNSF 4555, a CSX 4555 a KCS 4555. Dispatchers look at both the number AND the locomotive owners initials. This is how the same numbers are kept in order by who owns what.

[WilliamHBaird-eqhp]

British Railfans have been understanding that importance for 100-years! Most Canadian and American Railfans now record the Loco numbers for their photo collections now and to decipher the Locomotive model when unknown.

[ShawnTheDriver]

Danny: “Hello again railfans…”
*everyone liked that*

[pacirr]

At night, the identifying engine’s number boards are to be the only ones lit on the consist. This can sometimes get overlooked by the engineer. Also, I work for a different Class 1, but whenever we get a CSX engine, there is discussion as to whether it’s id is CSX or CSXT. The blue card in the cab is supposed to be the proper id, and it usually says CSXT, even though the outside of the engine always says CSX.

[neilcrawford]

Amtrak is 50.
Happy Birthday Amtrak.
As a none driver, I appreciate how important good public transport is.
Here in the UK it's 50 years of the Merseyrail brand. It brought together various commuter lines around Liverpool into one brand. It is now part of Merseytravel. It is the busiest commuter network in the UK outside of London. Not bad for a city region with a population of just 1.4m compared to London. The key being frequent and affordable trains, every 15 or 20 minutes, more frequent where two destinations share a common route, with 30 on a Sunday, and all the stations are staffed all day, everyday.

[still_guns]

In the UK, we used to run the train headcode (the full train's number, not the locomotive number) in lit panels on the front of the lead unit (be it locomotive or multiple unit driving car). That practice died out in the 60's/70's.
UK trains obviously still run with identifying numbers for the specific unit, but it to my knowledge the unit number is not used in radio transmission to assist in identifying a particular train on the network. It probably helps that much of our network is electronically tracked, so signallers will always know where a train is.

[colinmulder]

For railfans who grew up railroading around Florida between 1993-1996, the only time you'd see AMTK 160's paint scheme on Amtrak's DASH 8'S was when they were pulling the SUNSET LIMITED between Los Angeles, CA - Miami, FL three days a week in both directions.

[Brandon-wfew]

Literally just landed in LAX with an hour sit. Thanks for planning this out Danny.

[Old_Foxy_Grandpa]

We used the same basic practice on the Santa Fe. However, we added the Railroad and the engine number. OS I believe you said "on station" and out west, OS was "on Sheet" meaning that it was recorded in the train register by the op when the train passed. Good video.

[noahater]

Ah, so that’s how you were able to easily recognize what hazardous materials were in those tank cars, making a note of the 4 digit UN numbers on the placards

[billmorris]

Danny; I’m a retired road locomotive engineer off of the UP, via Texas & Pacific, then via Missouri Pacific through mergers. My home terminal for my whole career was New Orleans, Louisiana. I always ran trains over the same territory, which was most of Louisiana.

On our railroad the preferred ID locomotive was the lead unit, and was about 97% of the time. But it could be the rear unit in a multi unit consist. If so only the rear units number boards would be lit up. If it was one of the mid units it’s number board would be lit up. All the rest should have their number board lights turned off. Also the company reporting mark, UP, KCS, CSX, GATX, etc, etc, is part of the trains ID. The reporting mark would precede the number on train orders, track warrants, clearances, etc, etc.

In most cases like this the engineer would tell trains they were meeting or passing, that the rear or mid unit was their ID unit. I’m not positive about all railroads but most of them worked under the same rule. I’m not sure if the DPU on the rear of a train could be used for the ID. I never worked with DPUs.

This situation happened quite often on locals that turned during the same tour of duty. The dispatcher would sometimes use the same unit number for the return trip which would make it the rear unit on the return trip.

Also to make sure the whole train was there, there must be something to indicate the rear car is there. Like a caboose, flag, or FRED.

[ebnertra]

Engine numbers are still regularly used for Track Warrants (or Track Authorities if you're on CN's US lines) on GCOR railroads to grant authority to run on mainline track. It works great, since while there may be more than one section of U789 out there at the same time, there will only ever be one CN 2031at any given time.

I actually have an old track authority that fell from a passing train, addressed to BLE 903 North

[jovanweismiller]

I grew up in a division point on the UP. My grandfather, my dad, and two uncles all worked for the UP. When I went to work on the railroad, I ended up on the Santa Fe. Needless to say, I subscribed before I got around to hitting the like button! LOL!

[tonyburkhart]

As a novice rail fan I have found your videos to be incomparably the best produced and informative rail videos online. I well understand these productions aren’t nearly as easy as they might seem to achieve this level of production values. Thanks for your dedication and commitment to your railroad and media passions!

[bradklingensmith]

This is like a bonus holiday gift from Danny.

[meme-xnwr]

6:43 “let’s gooo toooo ova” I absolutely love that Amtrak crews always seem to be having a blast. When I took a train to NYC each crew seemed to have a lot of fun. I went to the last car on that trip, where the crew was hanging around, and they all had a bunch of fun with me.

[SgtGoodGaming]

I work in Downtown Tampa, And on the way home, I walk past Union Station with an Amtrak at the station. You can always hear them blowing their horns as they approach the station and leave the station. Everyday