Norfolk Southern’s Juniata Locomotive Shop

Norfolk Southern’s Juniata Locomotive shop can rebuild an entire locomotive in six and one half days flat!

Located in Altoona, Pennsylvania, the Norfolk Southern’s Juniata Locomotive shop is one of the busiest and oldest repair shops in the world!

It sits on 30 acres and can repair and service up to 1200 locomotives per year.

Out of Norfolk Southern’s 3800 locomotives, the shop usually sees 1200 of those locomotives per year for service and maintenance.

It is the only repair shop that has 5 massive inside service bays that are each about 2 football fields long!

The locomotive shop utilizes 27 tracks reaching to the 5 bays and gigantic round table to direct the locomotives to the proper bay to be worked on. Additionally, inside the bays are huge overhead cranes run by as few as 3 people that can actually lift a 200 ton locomotive from one track to the next to be worked on.

In the process of rebuilding a locomotive, they actually strip the locomotive down to the frame and start over with everything from wiring, engines and paint. By rebuilding a locomotive, they can add 15 to 20 years to the service life of the locomotive!

Let us know if you have worked on one of this giant machines or have taken a tour of such a facility! We love would love to hear your comments!