John Carr's CarrTracks

Burlington Northern
Freight Train Symbol History

There are several sections to the Burlington Northern Freight Train Symbol History. The freight train symbols are in numeric order by the last symbol used by each train on May 2, 1989. The list includes many trains no longer in operation. Many of these trains operated before the formation of Burlington Northern on March 3, 1970.

The condensed schedules after each train description lists the symbols used during the train's history. For pre-merger trains, the name of the railroad is also listed. Following the freight train symbol is the point of origin and the departure time, then the destination and the arrival time. The next number indicates how many days later the train was scheduled to arrive at its destination. If for example, the train departed on Monday and arrived on Tuesday then the number would be a one to indicate the next day. If the train terminated on the same day as it departed then no number is listed. The last pair of numbers indicate the year of the schedule. If the schedule was unchanged over a period of time, then the number may be 73-75 to indicate that the schedule was the same from 1973 through 1975.

To help you navigate between pages I've placed a navigation bar like the following in all of the other pages. Each page covers a range of train symbol numbers. To quickly jump ahead or move back to a particular page, just click on one of the number sets. Each page will still have a sequence button at the bottom right so you can step through all of the pages.

Other pages include:
Extra Trains
Unit Grain Trains
Regional Timetables The regional schedules may be useful in identifying scheduled trains you have photographed along the main line.