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Great Northern B40-8

So this was supposed to just be a quick repaint but one thing led to another and it actually turned out taking three days.

The mod includes:
a regular crewed version
one with no crew
one that’s reversed and no crew

it unlocks in 1996.
the fonts I used are from railsimstuff


uhh lore

The year is 1996. James J. Hill never acquired control of the Northern Pacific because Harriman was able to aqcuire all the shares and now had control over it. The Spokane, Portland and Seattle is never formed, Burlington Northern never happens, and BNSF by proxy also never happens. In the present day (1996), there are multiple routes to the Pacific over the northwest. You could ship through the Great Northern, Northern Pacific, The Milwaukee Road or the UP. The Milwaukee still exists because they made some strategic decisions in the 1960s, investing in expedited intermodal transportation and keeping the Pacific extension are examples.

When Amtrak was formed in 1971, Great Northern decided to opt out since ridership levels were still fairly high because they were running in the middle of nowhere, and the people on that line didn't have any other transportation methods. They kept the Empire Builder, Western Star, International, and the Gopher running until 1983, when they would eventually join Amtrak. They were one of the last privately operated interstate passenger trains in the United States. Amtrak did not keep the Western Star as a service and rerouted the Empire Builder to serve the same stations as the Western Star. The Gopher became the "North Star" and the "International" became the "Pacific International". The Pacific International was later folded into the Amtrak Cascades brand. Amtrak, in the present day (1996), runs both the North Coast Hiawatha and the Empire Builder.

Big Sky Blue continued to be a thing until 1996, when they decided to go back to the Empire Builder scheme to celebrate their 107th anniversary.