Pioneer Railcorp buys so-called "worst - maintained railroad in America"

After achieving notoriety on YouTube videos and in railfanning discussions as having the "worst maintained track in America", it looks like the Maumee & Western will have new life, albeit as another railroad:

http://www.prnewswire.com/news-rele...-from-maumee--western-railroad-185547852.html

 

If anyone knows of a good quality map for this operation, on line, I'd be interested in seeing it.

 

This is the footnote to a Youtube video on this line from someone going by the nom de cyber DelayInBlock:


Uploaded on Dec 28, 2011The Maumee & Western Railroad (reporting mark MAW) is located between Defiance and Napoleon, Ohio. It is a 15 mile long, shortline railroad. The line has three locomotives, ex-Illinois Central GP10 #16 (a GP9 rebuild) and two ex-Santa Fe Railway GP7U's (CNUR). Trains operate daily between Napoleon and Defiance, except for Saturdays and Sundays. This was a former Wabash Railroad mainline, which ran Westward from Toledo to Fort Wayne, IN. After the merger between Norfolk & Western Railroad and the Wabash Railroad, it became a neglected branch line under N&W, later being sold by Norfolk Southern to the Indiana Hi-Rail Company in the mid-80s.. Maumee & Western acquired the line in 1997 with financial assistance from the ORDC (after the Indiana Hi-Rail liquidated). The line passes through an area known as the Great Black Swamp. Combined with the fact that it was lightly built to start with, means lots of headaches. Maumee & Western, with continued assistance from the State of Ohio, has made some progress, but no heavy maintenance has been done to this track since the Wabash days (around 1964). The local port authority has offered to purchase the line, but Maumee & Western isn't interested in selling.


You have to give major props to the MAW for operating over this line. And to be fair, I have personally seen worse sections of track in my railfan travels, as I'm sure many of you have.

 

Probably, as you are obviously describing two rust streaks spiked to mud and grass ties?

 

One stretch that comes to mind is the former Frisco between Antlers and Hugo, OK. By the time Kiamichi acquired this line (as well as the Hugo-Paris and Lakeside-Hope sections), the "track" consisted of two more-or-less parallel rails sitting on pieces of crossties. The only traffic on this track was the occasional pulpwood train from the Nekoosa woodyard out of Antlers. KRR extensively rebuilt this track to Class 1 standards, and it now hosts runs out of a rock quarry at Good as well as log trains out of a Georgia-Pacific woodyard south of Antlers.

As to the now-former MAW. I have read various stories (which may or may not be speculation, so I won't repeat them here) about the management of this railroad. Apparently either the money offered by Pioneer was too good to pass up, or the present ownership grew weary of operating a shoestring railroad.

 

Has Pioneer continued with making repairs and upgrades?

 

From what I've read elsewhere, yes, they have.