be closed in favor of flat switching, while Pig’s Eye will be improved and play a key role in clas- sifying freight moving between the U.S. and Canada. Dakota, Minnesota & Eastern lines west of Pierre, S.D., will be sold or abandoned, and CPR will not build into the Powder River coalfields, as DM&E had planned to do. CPR will hold on to the perennially unprofitable former Delaware & Hudson as the railroad negotiates with connections to exchange running rights in order to optimize all parties’ routes. Harrison also said unit oil trains from North Dakota to Northeastern destinations should operate over more direct NS or CSX routes east of Chicago in- stead of using CPR via Toronto and Montreal.
Cumbres & Toltec Scenic The Last of the Electric Freight Railroads Is Sold; Juice Operations to Continue
THE IOWA TRACTION RAILROAD was sold in September to Progressive Rail Services, a short line holding company based in Minnesota. Now known as the Iowa Terminal Railway, this last of the electric freight haulers uses four Baldwin-Westinghouse motors dating from the 1920s to serve 10.4 miles of former Mason City & Clear Lake Traction Co. trackage between (surprise!) Mason City and Clear Lake, Iowa. The line interchanges with Union Pacific and Canadian Pacif- ic at Clear Lake Junction and handles mostly agricultural products and scrap.
rived at Snowflake on August 16; after that, Holbrook turns started running a couple of times a week behind two to five units. Catalyst says the railroad, like the mill, is up for sale.
Canadian National
MARITIMES ROUTE IN JEOPARDY: Canadian National has taken the first steps to abandon 139 miles of its Newcastle Subdivi- sion between Bathurst and Moncton, New Brunswick, which it reacquired from New Brunswick East Coast in 2008. The railroad says that revenue from freight traffic using the line segment does not justify the investment required to continue its operation; no through freights use the route. (CN took the line back from NBEC after the short line could not make a go of it, either, as on-line industries re- trenched, disappeared, or switched to trucks.) CN says it will work with the remaining ship- pers to convince them to put more traffic on the line and with government partners to fund capital upgrades. The line, which under feder- al law cannot be abandoned until 2014, is the route of VIA Rail’s triweekly Ocean, which runs between Montreal and Halifax, Nova Sco- tia. If the line is abandoned, VIA could possi- bly run over CN’s faster and shorter southern route through Edmundston, New Brunswick.
Canadian Pacific
WEST COAST SCHEDULES TIGHTENED: Canadian Pacific has reduced transit times on intermodal movements between Toronto, Chicago, and Vancouver to four days. Trains 100 and 101 between Toronto and Vancouver trim full a day off the 2600-mile trip’s previous
26 NOVEMBER 2012 •
RAILFAN.COM
schedule, and trains 198 and 199 between Chicago and Vancouver cover the 2200 miles two days faster than before. A reduction in ter- minal dwell time, quicker crew changes, and the elimination of intermediate switching ac- counts for much of the improved performance.
HARRISON OUTLINES CHANGES: In early December, Canadian Pacific President and CEO E. Hunter Harrison was to make a detailed pre- sentation of his planned changes for the compa- ny, but he provided a preview in an October meeting with labor leaders. The humps at most yards except for Pig’s Eye in St. Paul, Minn., will
HERITAGE BAILS OUT: In September, Heritage Rail Management, which earlier this year took over the operation of the state-owned Cumbres & Toltec Scenic Railroad in Colorado and New Mexico, gave the states six months’ notice that it planed to terminate its contract. In a letter to the Cumbres & Toltec Scenic Railroad Commission, American Heritage Chairman and CEO Allen Harper said that his company’s “ways of doing business do not fit well with government controlled entities” and their “constant second guessing and micro- management.” He suggested that C&TS hire its own rail operations manager who has rail and tourism marketing experience, rather than another contract operator. Harper also offered to stay on through the 2013 season in order to ease the transition.
In response, the Cumbres & Toltec Scenic Railroad Commission voted to end the Heritage contract on October 31, retaining General Man- ager Ken Masick and Special Projects Manager Ed Beaudette to oversee the operation. At the end of July American Heritage ended
its operating contract with the Texas State Rail- road, which it had run since September 2007. (Iowa Pacific Holdings has taken over this line; see story on next page.) American Heritage still owns and operates the Durango & Silverton Nar- row Gauge Railroad in Colorado and the Great Smoky Mountains Railroad in North Carolina.
Black River & Western 2-8-0 Returns to Service
BLACK RIVER & WESTERN’S CONSOLIDATION No. 60 pulled its first scheduled public trips since 2000 as it ran between Ringoes and Three Bridges, N.J., on November 10 and 11, 2012. Re- stored by the volunteers of the Black River Railroad Historical Trust at Ringoes, the 1937 Alco made its first, short test run on August 9 and then made a couple of unannounced test runs and a pulled a special train to Three Bridges for NRHS directors in October.
STEVE BARRY
MITCH GOLDMAN
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68 |
Page 69 |
Page 70