Rochelle IL in 1997 : C&NW + BN before the Railroad Park

Back in January 1997, shortly before the railroad park was built, I visited the busy diamonds at Rochelle, IL. Chicago & Northwestern and Burlington Northern (BNSF by that time) put on a great show. The video was shot at the diamonds and two separate crossings on the C&NW & BN east of town.

[@FireEMTRescue]

ahhhh, Rochelle, my home town. I still live there to this day

[@ShawnyNorburn]

Awesome action!!! I miss the BN and CNW.

[@mrspacecase]

In this district the UP still uses the old C&NW left-side running, opposite what most other railroads in the U.S. use today. The diamonds are still a great place to catch some rail fanning action! And on occasion you might see a C&NW Heritage engine passing by. I still love the C&NW!!!

[@nssd70m2]

Wow that last train had killer lashup on it!

[@IowaCornbeltRailfanProductions]

incredible that there was barely any UP even though this would be 2 years into the merger

[@CombatBuckee]

WOW! Now that sight of the CN and Wisconsin Central will probably never go through rochelle again!

[@bigshouldersrails1318]

Great video! Fascinating to see the diamond without the railroad park and so much CNW equipment a year and a half after the merger

[@backyardrailroader]

Nice video! Was there waaaaaay back in May 1991, and again in May 2003. Still a hoppin' place, but I think the intermodal facility kind of ruined it a bit, making the UP trains go by much slower when serving the facility...prefer trains moving at speed!

[@SignalMan9292]

Rip the Wonderful S3L horn. Pure 1990s sound

[@michaelpatrickhamilton3384]

It sure looks different without the Park it's cool to see CNW and CN there's still telephone poles along the tracks 🚂

[@kevinpurcell2093]

Thank you for the video.I am a rail fan and I like the C&NW. However, there are a few other railroads that I like.

[@BionicleStudios55]

This is so great!

[@oxolotleman7226]

Wow, completely different in only a little over 20 years. I wish old locomotive consists of gp38s and sd40-2s were still common on the rails today. That shiny sd75i is also a cool sight now that they are all old, still one of my favorite locomotives of all time.

[@eddieg749]

Very good videos!! The good old days

[@ClassIRailroader]

wow rochelle really looks different now

[@apostleverde]

Wow.. surprised at the prevalence of standard cabs in 1997. I recall watching many trains going through DeKalb, IL in 1994-1995 and it seemed like every one had a wide cab.

[@alansklenar2848]

CN was the only RR in the video with ditch lights

[@gcannon455]

Sad that a lot of places that you could photograph from are now off limits.

[@vermilionrailfan5651]

wow nice RS3Ls and RS5Ts

[@nickygaming1911]

I didn’t know that sd9043mac Union Pacific locomotives were around back then