So if you're running at max power and doing 50 MPH, your fuel consumption will be just over 4 gallons of diesel per mile. Per locomotive.
I hope what you have in the convoy is important enough for that fuel outlay.
Regarding the best way to scout ahead, using a "hyrail" vehicle (a truck with small bogey wheels that lower from the bumpers to keep the truck on the track, while the rubber wheels contact the track and provide traction) would be the best bet. Run the train at 10-20 MPH, with the hyrail some 5 miles ahead to monitor track conditions, line improperly-lined switches, check clearances, etc, and radio progress back to the lead unit while 4x4s roam parallel to the tracks to provide perimeter security (beware that railcars are 50-60 feet long on average, so if you have a sizable train you may have plenty of room between your rovers for ambushers to mess things up).
Also, modern locomotives are very sophisticated and very dependent upon computers and electric apparatus to run. I question whether or not they could even run at all after EMP. The U.S. rail system may then be relegated to steam operations only.
I didn't work during Y2K, but I did see some paperwork in an archive that crew instructions were to stop the train by ten minutes to midnight on 12-31-99 and await the go-ahead from the dispatchers, just in case switches malfunctioned (a very much bad thing when traveling over them at speed) or onboard computers dumped. Everything worked without hitch, I am told, but I seriously doubt that EMP would be that forgiving. Maybe the special EMP-resistant computer chips from one of the early T2K modules could be used to get an EMP-damaged locomotive up and running; that's an idea for a story or two. Or, perhaps, the small electric locos used in mines.
And finally, an empty railcar is about 25-30 tons. A hyrail vehicle, even a sturdily-built one, isn't going to move one easily or quickly, and not without great power consumption. So the idea of rigging up a Kenilworth as a hyrailer and pulling a coal train isn't going to cut it. You MIGHT move a single empty car, IF you can obtain enough traction (the bogey wheels aren't powered). And let's see you stop, once you get moving. I've seen backhoes affix a cable to a car's coupler and gingerly pull it into place, but that, too, is very resource-intensive.
Hope this helps.
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