{"id":16308,"date":"2026-06-02T10:00:59","date_gmt":"2026-06-02T15:00:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/iowahighwayends.net\/blog\/?p=16308"},"modified":"2026-06-02T01:35:54","modified_gmt":"2026-06-02T06:35:54","slug":"back-to-back-big-boy-stories","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/iowahighwayends.net\/blog\/2026\/06\/back-to-back-big-boy-stories\/","title":{"rendered":"Back-to-back Big Boy stories"},"content":{"rendered":"

KTIV has two stories related to the Union Pacific’s Big Boy going through western Iowa on Sunday. The first is about the train’s stop in Carroll.<\/a> The second, whose video plays after the first, is about maintenance of the train itself and the crew on the ride. For this year’s trip, celebrating the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, Big Boy has some special logos, as seen in the videos.<\/p>\n

The second story mentions that for the first time, Big Boy will continue east of Chicago, all the way to Philadelphia on July 4. Union Pacific is in the midst of trying to merge with Norfolk Southern to become the nation’s first truly transcontinental railroad, and Big Boy will be on NS’s rails from Chicago to Philadelphia. The UP’s press release says Big Boy<\/a> “will be accompanied by Norfolk Southern commemorative locomotives as well as a historical passenger car from Norfolk Southern\u2019s Heritage Fleet.”<\/p>\n

However, once the train leaves Pennsylvania, there will be no stops open to the public until it gets back west of the Mississippi River.<\/p>\n

Big Boy’s noon stop the next day was in Tama, where KCRG has a story.<\/a> It paused for a shorter time in Belle Plaine, a reversal of 2024, a stop I wrote about<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

KTIV has two stories related to the Union Pacific’s Big Boy going through western Iowa on Sunday. The first is about the train’s stop in Carroll. The second, whose video plays after the first, is about maintenance of the train … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-16308","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-iowa-miscellaneous"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/iowahighwayends.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16308","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/iowahighwayends.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/iowahighwayends.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/iowahighwayends.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/iowahighwayends.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16308"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/iowahighwayends.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16308\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":16309,"href":"http:\/\/iowahighwayends.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16308\/revisions\/16309"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/iowahighwayends.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16308"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/iowahighwayends.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16308"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/iowahighwayends.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16308"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}