PTRA Power – 1976

In case anybody cares about the PTRA, here’s a slide from my collection of Santa Fe SW9 1436 between assignments at the PTRA roundhouse in Houston on 4/25/76. It’s accompanied by MP 1251 and ATSF GP9 2920. PTRA motive power was supplied by its owner railroads until the 1996 arrival of the MK1500D’s. Before that, it wasn’t unusual to see power from all of its owner railroads (ATSF/BN/CRIP/MKT/MP/SP in 1976) mingling together here.
For the rivet counters, ATSF 1436 is a 1953-built SW9. It’s original road # was 2436 which it held until 1974 when ATSF decided to re-number all un-rebuilt switchers to the 1400 series. Upon graduating from its re-building at San Bernardino in 1/78, this unit became ATSF 1236 and received a Santa Fe model designation of SSB1200.
In 1984, the Santa Fe decided it was done with its 29 end-cab switchers. 18 went to Amtrak in partial trade for the 5250 class SDP40’s, with the balance sold to dealers or traded in to GE. This particular unit ended up at US Steel’s Fairless works in Pennsylvania.