Railfanning in the Southwest

by Dave Freshwater 

Belen, New Mexico 

I didn’t have the same luck the next day when I headed down to Belen, NM. Belen is a division point with a yard. There is also the Harvey House Museum right beside the yard and the old station. (Fred Harvey opened a chain of Harvey Houses in the southwest. He had a contract with the ATSF to provide meals to their passengers.) The yard in Belen reminds me of the yard at Enola. It isn’t as big, but lots of the yard sits at a higher level than the surrounding surfaces streets. You can take pictures of the trains on the outside tracks. But if a train is stopped on one of those, the view of the rest of the yard is blocked. Also, like Enola, there is a bridge over the north end yard throat. The sidewalk on this bridge was closed on my first visit. The bridge also has a chain link fence along it, without Enola’s photograph holes. The sidewalk was open when I made a later trip through town, but I never stopped to take pictures from that bridge.

There is a small park at the north end of Belen where the railroad passes under Business I-25 through town. I sat in this park and listened to the yard chatter on the scanner, hoping to get a photo before it got too dark. But, no trains left or entered the yard during that time. So, I went back to the hotel, packed, and hoped for better luck at the next stop on my travels.