THE DINNER BELLE

Fall is here! And with it arrives the fall excursion trains! One new train is the Dinner Belle.

The train sits in Hillsdale Yard with its F-unit locomotive, dinner, and rear dome. The train has just been pulled from storage, and is being inspected and readied for service.

 The yard crew watches as the train pulls out for its shake-down run to Dale City. A company photographer is on hand to record the event.

The F-7 was purchased from an equipment dealer in the 90's; it is believed to be from an obscure short line, but no one knows for sure. Surprisingly, while she's been rebuilt, she still has her steam generator and sill skirts!

As the train leaves, the conductor waives from the end vestibule of the dome car. When the train is in regular service, the vestible will be off-limits to everone -conductor included- for safety reasons.

Now in regular service, the dome car is seen here. The ex-UP car was purchased from Auto-Train during their 1981 bankruptcy auction, along with the ex-UP dinning car and another ex-UP dome.
The Dinner Belle, as its name indicates, is a dinner train which runs during the fall and winter months, with one section running from Pittsburgh and another from Washington, D.C.; both meet in Cumberland, Md., where they connect to another train that goes to Davis and Beckley, WVa., serving three ski resorts in those two areas. While running ski trains is an unusual deal for a large railroad such as the AP&W, the three resorts were founded by predecessor Appalachian RR, who ran winter ski trains annually since the 1930's, even after the creation of Amtrak in 1971. They are still popular today, which is why they are still run!