WATCO OPERATIONS IN NORTHWEST MONTANA
From Main Line to Mission Mountain
BY JUSTIN FRANZ/PHOTOS BY THE AUTHOR
WHEN MOST VISITING RAILFANS LAND IN northwest Montana, say at Glacier International Airport just north of Kalispell, their minds are already flooded with images of big, main line freight trains on BNSF Railway’s iconic Marias Pass line, too distracted to even notice the pair of lightly used rails just across the street from the airport. But unknown to most, those rails were once part of the Great Northern Railway’s main line to the Pacific Northwest and today is part of the Mission Mountain Railroad (MMT). Owned by the Watco Companies of Pittsburg, Kansas, the MMT operates on 40 miles of track be-
tween Kalispell and Columbia Falls in the Flathead Valley and between Stryker and Eureka in remote Lincoln County. Created from redundant trackage BNSF no longer wanted, the MMT has survived the economic downturn and the collapse of the timber industry. In 2012, the short line is turning a page toward what appears to be a bright and prosperous future – even if nobody seems to notice.
While the Mission Mountain can trace its roots to December 2004, when the railroad began leasing trackage from
BNSF, rails were first laid through the Flathead Valley in 1891, when the Great Northern reached
Kalispell. At the time, the railroad’s main line to the Pacific Ocean went through the growing frontier town and up and over Haskell Pass. In 1904, the GN realigned its main line to go through
Whitefish, about 15 miles
north of Kalispell. After that, the line over Haskell Pass was abandoned and eventually all that was left was a 14 mile branch from Columbia Falls to Kalispell.
While the southern segment of to- day’s Mission Mountain Railroad lost its main line status in the early 20th century, the northern section from
OPPOSITE: Mission Mountain’s SW1500 No. 1501 heads over U.S. Highway 2 near Evergreen, just outside of Kalispell, on March 6, 2012. At one time the route from Columbia Falls to Kalispell was part of Great Northern's original main line to the west, but today is part of Watco's Mission Mountain Railroad. ABOVE: No. 1501 switches covered hoppers at CHS Kalispell in the old industrial corridor in Kalispell. Plans call for the tracks through downtown to be removed, making scenes like this impossible in the future.
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