Along the Pocahontas District

Coal Trains & Time Freights

Travel back in time to southern West Virginia, deep in the heart of Appalachia, to experience the busy doubletracked stretch of Norfolk Southern mainline called the Pocahontas District. It's the mid 1990s and you're touring the "Pokey" from Williamson to Bluefield to watch heavy coal trains labor upgrade and speeding time-freights rush across the system.

The rugged terrain of this mountainous district has always been a challenge to the railroad. Numerous bridges carrying the tracks back and forth across the rivers are interspersed with eighteen tunnels that bore through the ridges along this line. The area's steep grades bring most trains down to a crawl and helper engines are required on almost all eastbound trains. The long climb up to Elkhorn Tunnel is a steady 1.4 percent grade.

Coal is king in these parts. You'll visit a coal mine where strings of hoppers are being topped off with this important commodity. Mine runs with cabooses are seen, as well as fleets of heavy mainline coal drags pulled by NS's newest locomotives. The Pokey is a railroading adventure where the scenery is spectacular and the obstacles are met with brute horsepower and ingenuity!

Category:

Travel & Events

Tags:

• Pokey
• coal
• pentrex
• train
• railroad
• southern
• west
• virginia
• Norfolk
• mainline
• mine

[bushwacker2008]

This is my home district. Pentrex does a good job on this one. My favorite spot on that line, Farm WV.

[warrenjohannes01]

im gonna buy this!!!!!!!!!

[NSNWFAN34]

@southern4501isawesom they do have heritagte units, but the paint schemes are not different than what you likely saw on the NW/SOU.

[southern4501isawesom]

i wish they didnt paint southern and n&w engines just the gevos dash nines and what ever its a part of your railroad you should keep the legacy of the N&W and the SOU atleast get some heritage units or something :(

[48alfaone]

The "Standard Cab Dash 8's" look Great, and what a cool looking Mountain Road!

[Larsky1010]

Great sound at 1:44!

[ns2527]

Upland is the best spot in the world to watch train on the grade

[karelfromholland]

Great to watch all that power.

[ljones121]

@bushwacker2008

hey buschwacker, thats very cool. I used to love ralfanning the the pokey. was always fun, and yea farm to about northfork is the best area to watch.

[trmania]

Thanks for the help!

[DJGENEX71]

Looks like an old Alco remote mine engine that they use in the place of the 'new' automated systems to move and unload/load the coal cars...

[NSwannabeEngineer]

Remote controlled. I would imagine.