Detroit Lakes, Minnesota — BNSF Staples Subdivision
The Northern Transcon through downtown, roughly 40 trains every 24 hours
Detroit Lakes, Minnesota — BNSF Staples Subdivision
BNSF Railway — Staples Subdivision (Northern Transcon), milepost 210.1; CPKC traffic also present · Detroit Lakes, Minnesota, United States
This operator has not granted Spotatrain permission to embed the feed, so we link to it instead.
Watch at Northern Transcon Railcams (broadcast on the Steel Highway Rail Cams channel)Streamed by Northern Transcon Railcams (broadcast on the Steel Highway Rail Cams channel)
Stream hosted by Northern Transcon Railcams (broadcast on the Steel Highway Rail Cams channel). Spotatrain links to the original feed and does not rebroadcast.
Northern Transcon Railcams watches BNSF's Staples Subdivision at milepost 210.1 in downtown Detroit Lakes, Minnesota, looking towards the depot. The operator counts nearly 40 trains a day and publishes a running train log with road numbers, symbols and car counts.
About this cam
Northern Transcon Railcams operates this camera at milepost 210.1 of BNSF's Staples Subdivision, looking towards the Detroit Lakes depot across a downtown street crossing. This is the Northern Transcon — BNSF's main line between Chicago and the Pacific Northwest — and Canadian Pacific Kansas City traffic runs here as well. The operator keeps a public train log recording road numbers, times, direction, cargo, car counts, symbols, axle counts and lead-unit photographs, published at ntr-otc.com. They state that nearly 40 trains pass in each 24 hours, and give a measured figure alongside it: an average of 34.7 trains per day over the preceding ten days. A scanner on a 55-foot antenna picks up BNSF and Canadian Pacific radio in Detroit Lakes; it is published separately on Broadcastify rather than mixed into the video. The stream is broadcast on the Steel Highway Rail Cams channel, but the camera is Northern Transcon Railcams' own.
What to watch for
Amtrak's Empire Builder passes here on its Chicago to Seattle and Portland run, and the operator lists the foreign power that turns up on BNSF trains: CP, CSXT, Ferromex, KCS, UP, CN, SP, and the local Otter Tail Valley Railroad. Because the camera looks across a street crossing in the middle of town, you see the gates drop and traffic stack up before each move, which makes it easy to catch. The depot in frame is the reason the location was chosen. The published train log is worth opening alongside the stream if you want to know what is coming.