You can see the old Milwaukee Road right of way right along US 191 between the In and the Bozeman Hot Springs. It right along side the highway. The Milwaukee Road kept that track operating servicing a grain elevator in Gallatin Gateway a few hundred yars from the Inn until the elevator burned to the ground around 1974 I believe. I can probably relate to Sarah a bit as I did take numerous trips with my relatives working on the Milwaukee Road in both Little Joes and box cabs. I will never forget those trips. Loved the Little Joes.
This is my latest dabbling at 'What if the Milwaukee Road survived...' Mainly, at some point, they would have acquired the Illinois Central/ICG system. So, I'm calling this one the day after the Milwaukee took over IC operations. A train heads south with a Milwaukee GP40 to show the new parent road, and a rare, pre-ICG painted GP40.
Interesting idea. I have entertained the idea, too, of maybe the Rock Island and Milwaukee merging. Except what would be the chances of those two failing railroads actually succeeding? I'm no expert, but that seems unlikely.
It wasn't the railroad's fault, but I have no real love for the Rock Island since I've read that the situation with the RI played a role in the government deciding not to offer assistance to the Milwaukee. Anyway, we're talking about a successful, and moderately prosperous Milwaukee Road, here, that needed access to the gulf coast.
The RI bankruptcy/embargo was about thirty days after the MILW west end embargo. Which included a whole bunch of the MILW's money losing, dud "mid-western" branch lines, those being the real cause of financial drain... Strange how much of the RI still exists today, which was falsely portrayed as being worthless assets.... I have a few times mused about the MILW going south of KC, MO. Being ICG by that time, they would have reached Mobile, Alabama. I wonder what kind of port that might have been, or developed?
Something reminiscent of the MILW is happening with CSX right now... maybe not to the same extreme, but familiar.
Driving thru WA state, visiting relatives in Coeur d'Alene and seeing all the MILW road right of way changes I have to think back to the days leading to the downfall of so many of our fallen flags. The Interstate system came to pass in the 60's reliance on rail for transit or for shipping large loads became less and less prevalent, the ability to pay for upkeep kept decreasing as new four lanes and some rebuilt two lanes opened. Now we are so heavily reliant on highways where fuels use eats at our economy and towns as Avery die off. Inevitable maybe, escapable probably, had the decision by Dwight D not been made to build the atrocities we have as far as concrete parking lots we may still be using public transit and rails for everyday use. I see little to no benefit anymore of the interstate system, to me it is a HUGE waste of repetitive expense as it basically drains our nation financially and as to humans where unacceptable growth, unacceptable destruction of open lands used for agriculture and the elimination of decent jobs once served by those locals that kept the businesses at hand busy supplying the needs of daily life. We are spoiled to a extreme.
Unfortunately I can pinpoint why and how the suburban and rural growth struck Washington. I lived through it. It all began with the Boeing Bust. Led by Seattle, which refused to make cuts and lower taxes, to ease folks through the economic slump. Thus businesses moved out and so did the people, to more affordable sites. That is the key word, "affordable". It remains so today. Since that time Seattle and King County have made many, many more mistakes. Including losing rail corridors which were vital to future light rail, etc. Not to mention those two entities trying to milk Boeing for property taxes- which resulted in Boeing HQ now residing in Illinois..... Microsoft has decentralized, also partly due to attack taxation. Those two governing entities refuse to learn by their errors, and continue with the same 'train' of beliefs. So, people and businesses also continue to, rightfully, seek more survivable means. Yes. There was suburban and rural growth prior to The Bust. But it was at an easy, natural pace due to simple population growth. The post-Bust years were more at a pace like pouring gas on a match. People were literally chased out, to financially survive.
It was something that I read in the Noel Holley book. He made the suggestion that since the government was providing funding the keep Rock Island operations moving, they would not be willing to pay to operate the Milwaukee Road, as well.
Know exactly what you mean here. Have seen it in the Oil booms gone bust to the Rust Belt and manufacturing losses in my area of the Midwest from over taxing trying to pay the na'er do wells the free moneys they called for. Over Liberal efforts to make poverty go away by stealing ever more taxes to artificially support welfare status that eventually dried up from the extreme taxes forcing companies and people to relocate elsewhere. So many Greenway Trails around here with minimal to limited users and use all costing millions that could have been used to create ever more public mass transit corridors to lower the need for highways expansions.
I'm getting ready to write this book and plan to do so next month during National Write A Novel Month. It will be called Derailed, unless I can come up with a better title.
I've started writing on my book, but I haven't gotten very far. Among other things, my mother has died, and we are here in Covington for the funeral. So I'm kind of in a holding pattern.
My deepest sympathy. That seems like such a trite phrase, but I truly empathize having lost my wife of 58 years back in March.
Thank you for the condolences. She was living with several health issues, so there is some relief there that she is no longer dealing with those. I am looking to start working on 'Derailed' again soon, but I'm not hurrying.
Continuing on the theme of what if the Milwaukee Road still existed, here's a Milwaukee transfer freight for the MRL behind an SD45 from each railroad.
I found out I had a more appropriate picture of an ICG system acquired by the Milwaukee. Here is an actual ICG lettered GP40 trailing a Milwaukee Road unit from the parent road:
That ICG paint scheme was pretty classy, I was just reading an issue of Railroad Photographer and there was an article that had some of these. Nice color combo!
....A very interresting article about MILW's Pacific Extension and finally it's demise in June's issue of Trains. Even if it avoids the embarrassing idea of mismanagement that sped up the end. But its last paragraph is very interresting. I allow myself to write it here, because it leads me to a question. "Mark Wegner, president of the Twin Cities & Western Railroad, which operates over former Milwaukee track in Minnesota, says there wasn't much need for the Milwaukee Pacific Extension when it was built but there is now that it is gone. Says Wegner : 'They were 30 years too late or 30 years too early, depending on how you look at it'. " My question : as that railroad was mostly built in remote areas, as far as I know, it appears that most of its ROW is still unused and dormant (I don't even know who it now belong to). Would it be feasible to reactivate this ROW, fix its bridges and tunnels, put new track on, and run trains ? would it have an economic consistency ? Has there been inquiries about that and has there been publicly disclosed conclusion about such an idea ? Dom, who is more than ever missing the Joes, even if he has only seen them in books and videos...