Train Simulator: Clinchfield Railroad: Elkhorn City to St. Paul

Fabulous and famous: The Clinchfield Railroad was one of America’s most extraordinary railroads. Often called “The Rio Grande of the East” for its spectacular scenery and challenging mountain railroading, the Clinchfield Railroad now comes to Train Simulator!

Train Simulator’s Clinchfield Railroad route re-creates the northern portion of the CRR, where the railroad wove its way through the daunting and magnificent Appalachian Mountains of eastern Kentucky and western Virginia and in in the process served a variety of on-line coal mines. The Train Simulator route represents the Clinchfield as it existed in the early 1980s.

The Clinchfield (which is now CSX’s Kingsport Subdivision) was both an extraordinary coal hauler and a busy and vital bridge line for manifest freight traffic, providing a link between the Chesapeake & Ohio on its north end and the Seaboard Coast Line in the south.

The Train Simulator Clinchfield Railroad route extends from the railroad’s northern terminus and connection with the C&O at Elkhorn City, Kentucky approximately 41 miles to St. Paul, Virginia, where the CRR connected with the Norfolk & Western. Along with Elkhorn City yard, the route includes the busy and important Dante, Virginia yard and engine terminal complex which served as the key point of CRR’s coal operations, the 5-mile Haysi branch, the massive McClure mine complex, various on-line mines and loading tipples, and stunning and classic CRR locations such as the “Breaks of the Big Sandy,” towering Pool Point Trestle, and numerous tunnels including the Clinchfield’s famed 7,800-foot-long Sandy Ridge tunnel.

As an engineer on the Train Simulator Clinchfield Railroad route, you’ll take the throttle of classic first- and second-generation Clinchfield Electro-Motive diesels to battle heavy tonnage and twisting grades of up to 1.5 percent. Motive power featured with the route includes the venerable EMD GP7 and F7, the workhorse EMD SD40, and the versatile EMD GP38, all in authentic CRR liveries. And the route also features freight rolling stock, including 70- and 100-ton coal hoppers, a variety of freight cars to tote tonnage in manifest freights, and a CRR-liveried caboose.

Key Features

• The famed Clinchfield Railroad as existed in the 1980s
• Main line extending from Elkhorn City, Kentucky to St. Paul, Virginia, 41 miles
• Elkhorn City and Dante yards and terminals
• Haysi Branch
• Spectacular Appalachian Mountain scenery
• Coal mines and loading tipples
• Includes:
  
  • Clinchfield first-generation EMD F7 and GP7 diesel locomotives
  • Clinchfield second-generation EMD SD40 and GP38 diesel locomotives
  • Selection of freight cars, including 70- and 100-ton hoppers and caboose
• 7 Career and 2 Railfan Mode scenarios
• Quick Drive compatible