For road freight traffic in the steam era the Elgin, Joliet & Eastern, styled the "Chicago Outer Belt Line," relied on a fleet of 2-8-2s. Most of these were classed AB and numbered in the 700 series, and were ordered from several builders between 1914 and 1930. No. 723 appears here at Porter, Indiana, on November 2, 1947, in a photo by Ralph H. Payne; she came from the American Locomotive Company in 1916. Members of the AB class had cylinder dimensions of 28x30 inches, a boiler pressure of 185 p.s.i., the usual 63-inch driver diameter, and a grate area of 57 square feet. They developed 58,707 pounds of tractive force. The earlier members of the class weighed 313,960 pounds, and had 4339 square feet of evaporative heating surface and 953 square feet of superheater surface. No. 723 was scrapped in 1949; the photo was acquired from an eBay vendor.