Richie Kennedy | route56.com

Welcome to route56.com

Welcome to my anchor point on the web. For over 20 years, I have shared various subjects regarding highway, railways, local radio, and more.

I chose the name “route56” in honor of the green and white variant of the US Highway shield that the Kansas Department of Transportation and its predecessor agency used specifically to mark US 56 from the designation of US 56 in 1956 until KDOT elected to adopt the standard black-and-white design in the mid-1980s

Click on the links above to access the pages devoted to the history of local radio and Kansas Highways, along with other creative outlets.

You can also find me on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter/X, and Flickr.

Latest Blog Posts

  • Standing on the Edge of Time

    Standing on the Edge of Time

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    Today’s archive re-scanning goes back to November 3, 2001…

  • Not the usual station

    Not the usual station

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    On a normal day, Amtrak’s Southwest Chief stops at the station in Lawrence. However, it is not the station seen in the featured image above.

  • How I voted – 2014 General Election

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    People who know me fairly well know I lean conservative on many issues. Therefore, it should come as no surprise that I pretty much voted a straight GOP ticket…. with one exception.

  • Amtrak Heritage Sweep

    Amtrak Heritage Sweep

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    In 2011, Amtrak painted a group of locomotives in special 40th Anniversary paint schemes resembling the different paint schemes on its locomotives. As a Depot Redux volunteer, I usually greet the Amtrak train on Saturday mornings. I’ve kept a lookout for the heritage units as well. Within a year’s time, I had seen every one…

  • Pat Roberts is really Clearance Oveur

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    A schtick/meme on the Dana and Parks show on KMBZ juxtaposes a quote by Senator Roberts with a line from Airplane.

  • Campaign voicemail

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    The campaign season is in full gear. The following audio clip is a robo-message left by the Roberts campaign on the family’s voicemail. I’ve edited it slightly; I’ll leave it to you to figure where I made the edit. 🙂

  • Two Kansas City northland layouts

    Two Kansas City northland layouts

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    This week, the Turkey Creek division of the NMRA held its monthly meeting at the home of two of its members. The purpose was to introduce some of its members who live south of the Missouri River to have a look at the model railroad work of their northlander counterparts. I took a whole bunch…

  • Lies and Damned Lies

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    I decided to do an unofficial poll on how the Kansas Governor’s race is looking, based on the results of last night’s primary. Basically, I compared the votes tallied for Brownback with the total voters for Jennifer Winn (Brownback’s primary opponent), Chad Taylor and Patrick Wiesner (the two Democrat candidates for the US Senate seat)

  • How I voted – GOP primary

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    I don’t mind that the state of Kansas can tell me my voting history (for the record, I’ve voted in every August/November statewide election, and have (maybe) only missed one city/school board election) Hell, I’ll even tell you how I voted 😛

  • Officers’ special

    Officers’ special

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    Today, Amtrak had an officers’ special to bring awareness of the Southwest Chief (and the possibility of it being forced to re-route if funding to upgrade and maintain the line between Newton and Albuquerque cannot be found)