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coaches for $7000 each. The rolling stock will be cut up. Three Rohr Turbotrain sets were refur- bished by Super Steel and ran briefly in 2003 before Amtrak took them out of service and moved them into permanent storage at the Bear, Del., shops. The trains were not accept- ed for revenue service due to problems with the air conditioning and the turbines’ high rate of fuel consumption.
OLD GE’S GATHER AT THE GROVE: In late December 2012 Amtrak’s last eight out of service P40DC locomotives were taken in a light power move from storage in Delaware to the main shop at Beech Grove, Ind., using the Cardinal route.
Apache Railway
MILL AND RAILROAD ARE SOLD: On De- cember 17, 2012 Catalyst Paper sold at auction its Snowflake, Ariz., paper mill and the associ- ated Apache Railway to Hackman Capital, which intends to continue railroad operations. The whole package went for $13,460,000.
BNSF Railway
OH, THOSE OTHER RAILROADS! When in 2010 Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Corp. bought a controlling interest in BNSF Railway, the transaction was thought not to come under the Surface Transportation Board’s purview since Berkshire did not own other rail- roads. As it turns out, not one, but two short lines were buried deep in the Berkshire family tree. The 13-mile White City Terminal Union Railway, which connects White City, Ore., with the Central Oregon & Pacific at Tolo, was owned by Berkshire’s Marmon Group, and the six-mile CBEC Railroad in Council Bluffs, Iowa, was owned by the Mid-America Energy Holding Co., also in the Berkshire fold. After the STB threatened to reopen the BNSF acquisition case, Berkshire got rid of both short lines; WCTU went to RVTR Rail Holdings and CBEC was sold to the Central Iowa Power Cooperative and the Corn Belt Power Cooperative .
Catskill Mountain Adds New Mileage; Pol Eyes Part of Route for Bike Path
THE CATSKILL MOUNTAIN RAILROAD WINTER HOLIDAY TRAIN of December 8, 2012, was the first regularly scheduled passenger train to cross Bridge C9 over Esopus Creek west of Kingston, N.Y., since New York Central train 528 on March 31, 1954. At the throttle was CMRR President Earl Pardini, who was brakeman on the last westbound revenue train to cross the bridge on the former Ulster & Delaware, a Conrail freight in 1976. CMRR currently operates two segments of the old U&D: from Phoenicia through Mount Tremper to Cold Brook and a short segment west of Kingston. The track remains in place but out of service between Highmount, where the Delaware & Ulster runs excursions west to Roxbury, and Phoenicia, and from Cold Brook past the Ashokan Reservoir to outside Kingston. The railroad, staffed and maintained by volunteers and with limited financing, has planned
for nearly 30 years to rehabilitate the track between Cold Brook and Kingston and provide through service between Kingston and Phoenicia. Ulster County Executive Mike Hein has other ideas, though. Hein wants to tear up the inactive trackage and convert the right of way to a recreational trail for use by cyclists, hikers, and horseback riders while leaving the cur- rently operated CMRR trackage in place and in service. (The county owns the rail corridor and leases it to the railroad.) The route would be combined with trails along other abandoned rail corridors in the region, including the Hudson Valley and the Walkill Valley Rail Trails.
Canadian National New Colors for an Ex-Con
TENNESSEE’S CANEY FORK & WESTERN has repainted its ex-CSX, nee-Conrail B23-7 at McMinnville, Tenn., from patched CR blue to this attractive green scheme to match its fleet of Geeps. Before being repainted, No. 107 carried its former CSX number 3162; it was built in 1978 as Conrail 1955. It’s unusual to see an old GE get such tender loving care. In addition, GP7s 103 and 104 have been moved to CFWR after the Mississippi-Tennessee was sold last year.
PIPELINE REPLACES TANK TRAINS: The Ultratrain unit trains which moved gaso- line, diesel fuel, and fuel oil over Canadian National rails from Ultramar’s Jean-Gaulin refinery in St.-Romuald (Lévis), Québec, to a distribution center in Montréal East was to have made its last run by the end of 2012. The trains have been replaced by the new St.-Lau- rent pipeline, which ramped up to full capaci- ty after being put into service in late Novem- ber. The 68-car daily trains used interconnected GATX TankTrain equipment and started running in 1996. The service was reliable and generally uneventful, except for several derailments. Only the Montréal trains are affected; Ultratrains U785 and U786 will continue to run over CN between Lévis and a distribution center in Maitland, Ontario (near Brockville), while cuts of Ultramar tank cars will continue to move in mixed freights to the Mirimichi, New Brunswick, distribution cen- ter via Moncton.
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BRIAN JUDD
DAN HOWARD
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