Overland Route Elephant Ear Replacement

Despite its status as an evil empire, Union Pacific has a surprising amount of legacy signaling on its premier transcontinental route between North Platte, NE and Ogden, UT. Sliding just under the falling boom of Safetran scallop-shells and off-brand LEDs, in the late 1980's Union Pacific chose US&S hardware for its overland route CTC project. This includes style N single housing color light signals and their extra large "elephant ear" backings. Similar to multiple projects on the Seaboard part of CSX, the Union Pacific elephant ears managed to survive the 2010's PTC push with the overlay being applied without signal or signaling replacement. 

Well it seems that one major shortcoming has these survivors on somewhat borrowed time. They are still connected to a pole line and here we can see that at least near Sidney, NE, some of the 80's signaling is being removed.  If this is a localized project or something larger remains to be seen, especially if UP's capital budget is constrained in future years.