No. 10631 Electro-Motive E-7 AB Diesel Locomotive heading up the "Champion" Streamlined Passenger Train

Atlantic Coast Line Railroad

          Three Southeastern railroads can be credited with pioneering the Florida streamliner movement in the late 1930s: Seaboard Air Line Railroad, Florida East Coast Railway, and Atlantic Coast Line Railroad.

         Seaboard was first, with its gleaming Budd-built air-conditioned stainless steel all-coach diesel- powered seven-coach streamliner between New York and Miami (see No. 10126), launched in February, 1939, on an every-third-day schedule, the "Silver Meteor." Then, in December, 1939, Atlantic Coast Line, in conjunction with ally Florida East Coast, introduced its own similar but daily air-conditioned diesel-powered lightweight coach streamliner between New York and Miami, the "Champion," which ran as a Florida East Coast train (see No. 10648) and as an Atlantic Coast Line train. Two "Champion" trainsets were delivered to ACL in silver and purple, and one "Champion" trainset to FEC in red and yellow, all powered by Electro-Motive E-3A diesel locomotives. Trip time for the "Champions" was 25 hours New York-Miami.

         In the summer of 1941, ACL expanded its "Champion" service by establishing separate trains to both coasts of Florida. These were referred to (by the end of the war) as the "East Coast" and "West Coast" "Champions." Throughout World War II the new streamliners' high capacity and high speeds made them a valuable asset as the Florida roads were called upon to move substantial passenger loads.

         Postwar, Seaboard, Atlantic Coast Line, and Florida East Coast began re- equipping their streamliners with new Budd-built lightweight passenger cars, and Seaboard introduced a companion train to the "Silver Meteor" in December, 1947, the "Silver Star." Streamlined sleeping cars were the only things missing from these coach and sometimes heavyweight sleeper-equipped trains (heavyweight sleepers had been added to the "West Coast Champion" in 1941, while the "East Coast Champion" remained mostly an all-coach train). This was solved with the appearance in 1949 of the Atlantic Coast Line/Florida East Coast winter-season-only streamlined extra-fare all- Pullman "Florida Specials,"(see Nos. 10354 & 10435), competition for Seaboard's vintage non-streamlined heavyweight sleeper-equipped "Orange Blossom Special" (see No. 10135). The "Blossom," established in 1925, could not compete with the newer and faster "Florida Specials," and was gone by 1953.

         Heavyweight (non-streamlined) sleeping cars had been added to the formerly all- streamlined all-coach "Champions" in 1941, then powered by Electro-Motive E-6 diesels (see No. 10576), and in 1948-1949 the trains were upgraded with new Budd-built coaches and sleepers, becoming once again completely streamlined with lightweight equipment on a fast 24-hour schedule between New York and Miami. The upgrade continued with the substitution of newer EMD E-7 locomotives for the E-6s in 1949.

         The "Champions" continued service to Florida's west coast as well as the east coast postwar, becoming a west coast only streamliner after the 1967 merger with Seaboard referred to below. The Seaboard Coast Line Miami "Champion" was terminated in December, 1967.

         The Florida trains had continued to draw high ridership through the 1960s, a time when many other long-distance American trains were being downgraded or eliminated.

         In July, 1967, Seaboard Air Line and Atlantic Coast Line merged to form Seaboard Coast Line Railroad. By this time, Florida East Coast was out of the picture due to a disastrous strike in 1963 which caused the elimination of its name train passenger operations.

         SCL found operating costs mounting in the late 1960s, and made the hard choice to turn over its fleet to Amtrak in 1971. In October, 1979, Amtrak terminated the Florida west coast New-York-Tampa-St. Petersburg "Champion." Today's Amtrak Florida fleet boasts three daily trains in each direction, the "Silver Meteor," "Silver Star," and "Auto Train"(2006).

         Power for these trains, except for partner Pennsylvania Railroad's electrified lines between New York and Washington (see No. 10126), was furnished by General Motors Electro-Motive Division's popular "E" and "F" series diesel locomotives.

         No. 10631 represents an accurate scale model of Atlantic Coast Line's Electro- Motive E-7 AB diesel locomotive (2000 horsepower per unit), heading up the 6-car streamlined train the "Champion" as it would have been seen as the east coast section between New York and Miami postwar, 1949 through the 1950s and early to mid-1960s, on non-electrified sections of the route. The train is in "O" gauge, the locomotive by Williams and the cars by K-Line, custom painted in silver and purple, Atlantic Coast Line's colors in the streamliner era.

         Addendum: THE ATLANTIC COAST LINE RAILROAD/FLORIDA EAST COAST RAILWAY RELATIONSHIP 1888-1962 As early as 1871, the name "Atlantic Coast Line" was informally applied to the coordinated service supplied by a group of independent railroad companies linking Richmond, Virginia, and Wilmington, North Carolina. In 1900, a single railroad company was formally formed, the Atlantic Coast Line Railroad, consisting of a 1676-mile system extending from Richmond to Charleston, South Carolina. Then, in 1901, ACL and five other railroads assumed control of the Richmond, Fredericksburg & Potomac Railroad, providing ACL trains access to Washington, D. C. With the acquisition of the Plant System of railroads running south and west of Charleston in 1902 (see No. 10700A), ACL's core route map was pretty much complete, for it included Jacksonville (in the Plant acquisition), gateway to all of Florida.

         Although absorbing the Plant System gave ACL access to Florida cities such as Ocala, Orlando, Tampa, and St. Petersburg, it had no trackage of its own down Florida's promising east coast to Miami. It is from this background that Atlantic Coast Line and Flagler-developed Florida East Coast Railway entered into an arrangement as early as 1888 for the use of FEC's tracks for ACL's Florida east coast through trains.

         A train from New York to Miami, for instance, whether ACL or FEC, would use Pennsylvania Railroad tracks to Washington (Pennsylvania locomotive); the Richmond, Fredericksburg & Potomac rails to Richmond; the Atlantic Coast Line to Jacksonville; (ACL locomotive Washington-Jacksonville); and finally the Florida East Coast right-of-way to Miami (after 1896) (FEC locomotive). This arrangement worked well for both railroads 1888-1962.

         Since Atlantic Coast Line and Florida East Coast trains had identical routes along the Eastern Seaboard with common destinations for an extensive period of time, it made sense for the two roads to share passenger train names, regardless of ownership. This they did, starting with the "New York and Florida Special" (later abbreviated to "Florida Special") in 1888 (see No. 10354, ACL; and No. 10435, FEC). This practice continued with the "Havana Special," which commenced operating in 1878 on ACL, New York-Cedar Keys (on Florida's Gulf Coast), and later New York- Key West (after 1912); and on FEC in 1912, with the opening of the Key West Extension, New York-Key West (see Nos. 10700B and 10701C). This was true also with 1939's streamliners "Champions," New York-Miami; ACL's in silver and purple (see No. 10576), and FEC's in red and yellow (see No. 10738). Other passenger trains with names shared by ACL and FEC were the "Dixie Flagler," "Dixie Flyer," "Dixieland," "Dixie Limited," "Everglades Limited," "Floridan," "Miamian," and "Vacationer." Sharing long-distance train names was a common practice among American railroads nationally in the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries (until Amtrak in 1971) (See the "California Zephyr" trainsets, No. 10251, as an example, that ran on and were owned by three different railroads, between Chicago and San Francisco).

         When Florida East Coast suffered a disastrous strike in January, 1963, ending all name train passenger services on its tracks permanently, Atlantic Coast Line began to enter Miami over Seaboard Air Line Railroad's tracks in central Florida, through Wildwood, Winter Haven, Sebring, and Okeechobee, instead of using Florida East Coast's tracks as before (Seaboard had reached Miami and Naples with its own tracks in 1927). This relationship led to Atlantic Coast Line's merger with Seaboard in 1967 to form the Seaboard Coast Line Railroad. By this time Florida East Coast was a freight carrier only, between Miami and Jacksonville, and rapidly becoming a real estate development company, primarily.

         Seaboard Coast Line continued to run most of the name trains of Atlantic Coast Line and Seaboard Air Line, with minor schedule changes. Then, on May 1, 1971, the federal government (Amtrak) took over the operation of the nation's passenger trains, keeping SCL's New York-St. Petersburg "Champion" and the New York-Miami "Silver Meteor" (see No. 10126) and "Silver Star." The Chicago-Miami/St. Petersburg "South Wind" (see No. 10705) was retained, becoming the "Floridian" in November, 1971. The "Florida Special" (see No. 10354) was kept on for a short time only and was discontinued in April, 1972, marking the end of winter-season-only Florida trains. In 1979, "Champion" and "Floridian" service was terminated. Today (2006) most of Amtrak's east coast trains continue to ride the former Atlantic Coast Line/Seaboard rails, including the New York- Miami "Silver Meteor" and "Silver Star." The "Auto Train," established in 1971, continues to use the former ACL tracks between Lorton, Virginia, and Sanford, Florida. Amtrak's Florida fleet is joined by one more train, between Orlando and Jacksonsville, the Orlando-Los Angeles "Sunset Limited" (see No. 10600). There are no Chicago-Florida passenger trains now; the route has been freight- only since the "Floridian" expired in 1979.