Throwback Thursday

 

by Keith MacCauley

SP 9716 

Southern Pacific Railroad GP60 SP 9716 was delivered from GMDD London some thirty-four years ago in April of 1991. Further to the acquisition of Southern Pacific by Union Pacific in 1996, the late model B – B unit would initially be renumbered UP 5816. Subsequent renumbering would include UP 2016, followed by the current identity of UP 1043.

EMD/GMDD’s GP60 was the last four axle road switcher type locomotive to be catalogued by the legendary long-term builder. SP 9794 would bring down the curtain on GP60 production in January of 1994. Richard M Dilworth’s General Purpose (GP) series of locomotives established an enduring form of diesel electric locomotive. From his pioneering GP7 of 1949 (CNW 1518), over first and second-generation design development to the GP60, horsepower would more than double from 1,500 to 3,800. Distinctive to the GP60 model was cab design; so called ‘Spartan’ (introduced with the GP35), ‘Comfort Cab’ (GP60M) and none (GP60B). GP60 customers would include Norfolk Southern, Rio Grande, Texas Mexican, Department of Energy and Southern Pacific, (with both SP and SSW reporting marks) who would acquire almost half of the nearly four hundred produced. Aside from wreck removals, virtually all GP60 variants soldier on, albeit mainly for subsequent merger railroads Burlington Northern Santa Fe and Union Pacific. Of note, most are now assigned to workaday way freight duties, some distance from the high priority intermodal type assignments they originally hauled.