Springtime on the B&O; April 2024 Railfanning in Harpers Ferry, West Virginia, on the Historic Main.

Hello everyone! On the third Friday of April (April 19th, 2024), I stopped at the iconic American historical site of Harpers Ferry, West Virginia, and spent the afternoon railfanning on the original Baltimore and Ohio Mainline. This mainline through Harpers Ferry is one of the oldest continuously used mainlines in the United States, having connected Baltimore and Washington DC to Cumberland for nearly two centuries. Though the line does not see as many trains as in its glory days (partially due to the Baltimore Bridge Collapse), this iconic railfanning location still sees a good variety between the CSX trains, Amtrak's Capital Limited, and the weekday MARC commuter trains.
Perhaps the best feature about Harpers Ferry is the vast amount of scenery in the area that provides a good number of vantage points to view the trains. Throughout the afternoon, I went to a handful of different locations around the site to see the action. I started off with catching the Eastbound Capital Limited arriving about 40 minutes behind schedule at the train station. After Following a dead period of action, I ventured down to the shore of the Potomac River near the base of the bridge to see the next four CSX trains and the Westbound Capital Limited. The CSX trains on the afternoon included a pair of coal trains, one loaded and one empty, westbound intermodal train I135 from Norfolk, Virginia, and manifest M416 on its way to Rocky Mount, North Carolina. In between these CSX trains at the main bridge was a surprise ballast train heading south on the Shanandoah Branch, the other CSX line in Harpers Ferry. I had to catch this one going through town as I was coming back from a lunchbreak and did not have enough time to see it crossing the other bridge.
After the Westbound Capital Limited rolled on through, I did some more railfanning at the depot and caught I136, the eastbound intermodal counterpart to I135, as well as a pair of MARC trains. Just before I left Harpers Ferry around dusk, a local train on the Shanandoah Branch passed by going north, and I was fortunate enough to stop and see it. Overall, it was a solid day of railfanning aside from the rain, and as I mentioned traffic is down a bit thanks to the events that took place in the Port of Baltimore earlier this year. Hopefully this downturn in traffic will not be a permanent one as the State of Maryland needs this mainline to connect their state to the rest of the country.
Thanks for Watching, and I hope you enjoy the video!
-N&W475.