1986 in rail transport
Encyclopedia
January events
- January 1 – The Soo Line RailroadSoo Line RailroadThe Soo Line Railroad is the primary United States railroad subsidiary of the Canadian Pacific Railway , controlled through the Soo Line Corporation, and one of seven U.S. Class I railroads. Although it is named for the Minneapolis, St. Paul and Sault Ste...
fully absorbs the Milwaukee Road after attempting to operate it as a subsidiary railroad. - January 3 – VancouverVancouverVancouver is a coastal seaport city on the mainland of British Columbia, Canada. It is the hub of Greater Vancouver, which, with over 2.3 million residents, is the third most populous metropolitan area in the country,...
's SkyTrainSkyTrain (Vancouver)SkyTrain is a light rapid transit system in Metro Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. SkyTrain has of track and uses fully automated trains on grade-separated tracks, running mostly on elevated guideways, which helps SkyTrain to hold consistently high on-time reliability...
begins operations between the waterfront and New WestminsterNew Westminster, British ColumbiaNew Westminster is an historically important city in the Lower Mainland region of British Columbia, Canada, and is a member municipality of the Greater Vancouver Regional District. It was founded as the capital of the Colony of British Columbia ....
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February events
- February 8 – 23 people are killed in the Hinton train collisionHinton train collisionThe Hinton train collision was a railway accident that occurred on February 8, 1986. Twenty-three people were killed in a collision between a Canadian National Railway freight train and a Via Rail passenger train. It was the most lethal Canadian rail disaster since the Dugald accident of 1947...
when a Via RailVIA RailVia Rail Canada is an independent crown corporation offering intercity passenger rail services in Canada. It is headquartered near Montreal Central Station at 3 Place Ville-Marie in Montreal, Quebec....
passenger train collides with a Canadian National RailwayCanadian National RailwayThe Canadian National Railway Company is a Canadian Class I railway headquartered in Montreal, Quebec. CN's slogan is "North America's Railroad"....
freight train near Hinton, AlbertaHinton, AlbertaHinton is a town in west-central Alberta, Canada.It is located in Yellowhead County, northeast of Jasper and about west of Alberta's capital city, Edmonton, at the intersection of Yellowhead and Bighorn Highway, in the Athabasca River valley.-History:...
. - February 17 – Class 59British Rail Class 59The Class 59 Co-Co diesel locomotives were built and introduced between 1985 and 1995 by Electro-Motive Division of General Motors for private British companies, initially Foster Yeoman...
Co-Co diesel locomotives built by EMD for Foster YeomanFoster YeomanFoster Yeoman Limited, based in the United Kingdom, is one of Europe's largest quarrying and asphalt companies, owned by Swiss construction materials conglomerate Holcim.-Company history:...
introduced into heavy freight service on British RailBritish RailBritish Railways , which from 1965 traded as British Rail, was the operator of most of the rail transport in Great Britain between 1948 and 1997. It was formed from the nationalisation of the "Big Four" British railway companies and lasted until the gradual privatisation of British Rail, in stages...
, the first USUnited StatesThe United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
-built (and privately-owned) diesel locomotives to operate regularly on the English network.
March events
- March 25 – Conrail makes its initial public offeringInitial public offeringAn initial public offering or stock market launch, is the first sale of stock by a private company to the public. It can be used by either small or large companies to raise expansion capital and become publicly traded enterprises...
of stock starting at $United States dollarThe United States dollar , also referred to as the American dollar, is the official currency of the United States of America. It is divided into 100 smaller units called cents or pennies....
28 per share.
July events
- July 24 – The United StatesUnited StatesThe United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
Interstate Commerce CommissionInterstate Commerce CommissionThe Interstate Commerce Commission was a regulatory body in the United States created by the Interstate Commerce Act of 1887. The agency's original purpose was to regulate railroads to ensure fair rates, to eliminate rate discrimination, and to regulate other aspects of common carriers, including...
denies the merger of the Santa FeAtchison, Topeka and Santa Fe RailwayThe Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway , often abbreviated as Santa Fe, was one of the larger railroads in the United States. The company was first chartered in February 1859...
and Southern Pacific RailroadSouthern Pacific RailroadThe Southern Pacific Transportation Company , earlier Southern Pacific Railroad and Southern Pacific Company, and usually simply called the Southern Pacific or Espee, was an American railroad....
, citing an excessive amount of parallel track as one reason for the denial. - July 26 – The Lockington rail crashLockington rail crashThe Lockington rail crash occurred on 26 July 1986 at Lockington, Humberside , England, when the 09:33 passenger train from Bridlington to Hull on the Yorkshire Coast Line hit a Ford Escort van on a level crossing...
at LockingtonLockington, East Riding of YorkshireLockington is a small village and civil parish in the East Riding of Yorkshire, England. It is situated approximately north west of Beverley town centre.The civil parish is formed by the villages of Lockington and Aike and the hamlet of Thorpe....
, HumbersideHumbersideHumberside was a non-metropolitan and ceremonial county in Northern England from 1 April 1974 until 1 April 1996. It was composed of land from either side of the Humber Estuary, created from portions of the East and West ridings of Yorkshire and parts of Lindsey, Lincolnshire...
, England occurred when a van was struck on a level crossing. Eight passengers on the train, and a boy of 11 in the van, lost their lives.
September events
- September 5 – The Dakota, Minnesota and Eastern RailroadDakota, Minnesota and Eastern RailroadThe Dakota, Minnesota and Eastern Railroad is a Class II railroad subsidiary of the Canadian Pacific Railway operating across South Dakota and southern Minnesota in the northern plains of the United States...
begins operations in MinnesotaMinnesotaMinnesota is a U.S. state located in the Midwestern United States. The twelfth largest state of the U.S., it is the twenty-first most populous, with 5.3 million residents. Minnesota was carved out of the eastern half of the Minnesota Territory and admitted to the Union as the thirty-second state...
and South DakotaSouth DakotaSouth Dakota is a state located in the Midwestern region of the United States. It is named after the Lakota and Dakota Sioux American Indian tribes. Once a part of Dakota Territory, South Dakota became a state on November 2, 1889. The state has an area of and an estimated population of just over...
. - September 5 – Portland, OregonPortland, OregonPortland is a city located in the Pacific Northwest, near the confluence of the Willamette and Columbia rivers in the U.S. state of Oregon. As of the 2010 Census, it had a population of 583,776, making it the 29th most populous city in the United States...
's light rail system, MAX, opens for service. - September 8 – The Crab Orchard & Egyptian Railroad becomes the last common carrier freight railroad in AmericaUnited StatesThe United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
to cease using steam locomotives as primary power when the dry-pipe in their CLCCanadian Locomotive CompanyThe Canadian Locomotive Company, commonly referred to as CLC, was a Canadian manufacturer of railway locomotives located in Kingston, Ontario. Its works were located on Ontario Street and Gore Street on Kingston's waterfront....
2-8-02-8-0Under the Whyte notation for the classification of steam locomotives, 2-8-0 represents the wheel arrangement of two leading wheels on one axle , eight powered and coupled driving wheels on four axles, and no trailing wheels...
#17 steamer collapses. - September 19 – Two high speed trainHigh Speed TrainThere are three types of trains in Britain that have been traditionally viewed as high speed trains:* Advanced Passenger Train - Tilting trains which never entered into regular revenue-earning service....
s collide near RugeleyRugeleyRugeley is a historic market town in the county of Staffordshire, England. It lies on the northern edge of Cannock Chase, and is situated roughly midway between the towns of Stafford, Cannock, Lichfield and Uttoxeter...
, StaffordshireStaffordshireStaffordshire is a landlocked county in the West Midlands region of England. For Eurostat purposes, the county is a NUTS 3 region and is one of four counties or unitary districts that comprise the "Shropshire and Staffordshire" NUTS 2 region. Part of the National Forest lies within its borders...
, EnglandEnglandEngland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
, in the Colwich rail crashColwich rail crashThe Colwich rail crash occurred on the evening of Friday 19 September 1986 at Colwich Junction, Staffordshire, England. It was significant in that it was a high speed collision between two packed express trains...
; the driver of one of the two trains was the only fatality of this accident.
October events
- October 31 – Closure of the "Corkickle Brake" serving a chemical works at WhitehavenWhitehavenWhitehaven is a small town and port on the coast of Cumbria, England, which lies equidistant between the county's two largest settlements, Carlisle and Barrow-in-Furness, and is served by the Cumbrian Coast Line and the A595 road...
, CumbriaCumbriaCumbria , is a non-metropolitan county in North West England. The county and Cumbria County Council, its local authority, came into existence in 1974 after the passage of the Local Government Act 1972. Cumbria's largest settlement and county town is Carlisle. It consists of six districts, and in...
, the last commercially operated standard gaugeStandard gaugeThe standard gauge is a widely-used track gauge . Approximately 60% of the world's existing railway lines are built to this gauge...
cable railwayCable railwayA cable railway is a steeply graded railway that uses a cable or rope to haul trains.-Introduction:...
in the United KingdomUnited KingdomThe United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
.
November events
- November 11 – Preserved steam locomotiveSteam locomotiveA steam locomotive is a railway locomotive that produces its power through a steam engine. These locomotives are fueled by burning some combustible material, usually coal, wood or oil, to produce steam in a boiler, which drives the steam engine...
British Railways Standard class 8 71000 Duke of Gloucester is officially recommissioned to service on the Great Central RailwayGreat Central Railway (preserved)The Great Central Railway is a heritage railway split into two adjacent sections, one in Leicestershire and the other Nottinghamshire.The Leicestershire section is currently Britain's only double track mainline heritage railway, with of working double track, period signalling, locomotives and...
following a 13-year restoration from part-dismantled condition. - November 15 – AustraliaAustraliaAustralia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
's well known steam locomotiveSteam locomotiveA steam locomotive is a railway locomotive that produces its power through a steam engine. These locomotives are fueled by burning some combustible material, usually coal, wood or oil, to produce steam in a boiler, which drives the steam engine...
3801 is recommissioned at the Hunter ValleyHunter ValleyThe Hunter Region, more commonly known as the Hunter Valley, is a region of New South Wales, Australia, extending from approximately to north of Sydney with an approximate population of 645,395 people. Most of the population of the Hunter Region lives within of the coast, with 55% of the entire...
Training Company in NSWNew South WalesNew South Wales is a state of :Australia, located in the east of the country. It is bordered by Queensland, Victoria and South Australia to the north, south and west respectively. To the east, the state is bordered by the Tasman Sea, which forms part of the Pacific Ocean. New South Wales...
. - November 21 – The Florida Central RailroadFlorida Central Railroad (current)The Florida Central Railroad is one of several short line railroads run by the Pinsly Railroad Company. Its only interchange point is with CSX in downtown Orlando, Florida; it has trackage rights from there south to Taft Yard...
begins operations in FloridaFloridaFlorida is a state in the southeastern United States, located on the nation's Atlantic and Gulf coasts. It is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the north by Alabama and Georgia and to the east by the Atlantic Ocean. With a population of 18,801,310 as measured by the 2010 census, it...
, United StatesUnited StatesThe United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
. - November 27 – Oslo Central Station in OsloOsloOslo is a municipality, as well as the capital and most populous city in Norway. As a municipality , it was established on 1 January 1838. Founded around 1048 by King Harald III of Norway, the city was largely destroyed by fire in 1624. The city was moved under the reign of Denmark–Norway's King...
, NorwayNorwayNorway , officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic unitary constitutional monarchy whose territory comprises the western portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula, Jan Mayen, and the Arctic archipelago of Svalbard and Bouvet Island. Norway has a total area of and a population of about 4.9 million...
is taken into use.
July deaths
- July 14 – Raymond LoewyRaymond LoewyRaymond Loewy was an industrial designer, and the first to be featured on the cover of Time Magazine, on October 31, 1949. Born in France, he spent most of his professional career in the United States...
, industrial designer who worked for the Pennsylvania RailroadPennsylvania RailroadThe Pennsylvania Railroad was an American Class I railroad, founded in 1846. Commonly referred to as the "Pennsy", the PRR was headquartered in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania....
designing the shape of equipment such as the GG1PRR GG1The PRR GG1 is a class of electric locomotives that was built for the Pennsylvania Railroad for use in the northeastern United States. A total of 140 GG1s were constructed by its designer General Electric and the Pennsylvania's Altoona Works from 1934 to 1943....
(b. 1893).