Aerotrain (GM)
[1][2][3] GM originally designated the light-weight consist as Train-Y (Pullman-Standard's Train-X project was already underway) before the company adopted the Aerotrain marketing name.
[3] The company completed the Aerotrains by coupling each of the two locomotives to sets of ten modified GM Truck & Coach Division (GMC) 40-seat intercity highway bus bodies.
Designed to resemble the new PD-4501 Scenicruiser buses that GMC was building for Greyhound, the Aerotrain's passenger cars had windows with slanted sides.
[8] Each car rode on two axles with an air suspension system that was intended to give a smooth ride, but had the opposite effect.
In late February 1956, the Pennsylvania Railroad rented the first train from GM and began operating it between New York City and Pittsburgh as the Pennsy (No.
[3] In late April, the New York Central began to operate that train in revenue service as the Great Lakes Aerotrain between Chicago and Detroit during a trial period.
[8][14][15] The Pennsy continued to run between Philadelphia and Pittsburgh until June 1957, after which time the first trainset joined the second in the Union Pacific's City of Las Vegas service.
Although the Rock Island scrapped or re-used most of the trainsets' equipment, both locomotives and two pairs of coaches remain on display in museums.
[20] The American Car and Foundry Company constructed the Jet Rocket's coaches, most of which were similar, but not identical, to those of the Talgo II.
[18] GM's "lightweight with a heavyweight future" was introduced at a time when passenger train revenues were declining due to competition from airlines and private automobiles.
A Union Pacific LWT-12 later required the assistance of a 1,750 horsepower EMD GP9 switcher locomotive to transport the cars of the City of Las Vegas up Southern California's Cajon Pass.
Two separate trains, designed and built as scale replicas of the futuristic Aerotrain, traveled a figure-eight track through parts of Tomorrowland and Fantasyland parallel to a portion of the Disneyland Railroad (DRR) main line.
Motive power for each train consisted of an integral head-end unit driven by an Oldsmobile "Rocket" V8 gasoline engine.
The attraction operated until September 15, 1958, when construction began on the Matterhorn and Submarine Voyage; the Disneyland Monorail System took the place of the Viewliner in June of the following year.
[30] Train-X was a lightweight set of nine short all-aluminum coaches articulated together that Pullman-Standard built and that two 1,000–horsepower Baldwin RP-210 diesel-hydraulic locomotives (one on each end) transported.
