Tuesday, October 23, 2012

The Northern Pacific's Vista-Dome North Coast Limited, 1955


Seen in Montana hauled by an F unit A+B+A lash-up. The original Chicago to Seattle North Coast Limited from 1900 had the "Vista Dome" added to the name in 1955 as in the revamped train there were two dome coaches and two dome sleepers in a single train consist, making a total of four dome cars. The Budd-built dome sleepers had four roomettes in the short end, four double bedrooms in the long end, and four single bedrooms under the dome. The Northern Pacific was careful to place at least one flat-topped car between each dome car to maximize passengers’ view.

In 1954 the “Pine Tree” or "Streamline" livery consisting of grey roof, dark-green letterboards, light-green windowband and dark green lower sides with black trucks was changed to the train's more famous two-tone green paint scheme.  The train now was painted with a green roof, letterboards and windowband, a thin white line below the window band and pale mint green lower sides with black trucks; most car names were replaced with numbers.

advert from 1956

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