I work for the big “brown” shipping company, and one of the addresses I deal with every day is for Canadian Pacific Railway, at 3420 E. Van Norman Avenue in Cudahy, WI – right along the UNION PACIFIC tracks (Kenosha Sub).
Whay does CP have a facility in Cudahy, instead of somewhere along their own tracks? Was this once a Milwaukee Road property? How did MILW/SOO/CP end up with this facility? (Answer any other related questions pertaining to this subject too, since I’m sure I’m forgetting to ask something… [;)])
I drove past it the other day, and noticed several signal cabinets, but didn’t have time for a closer look. Maybe those K-ville wig-wags made a stop here, before ending up in someone’s garage!!!
If there is no rail service involved with the building you are delivering to, it could simply be a case of CP needed office space for some administrative function (local sales?) and the price was right.
The CP facility fuzzybroken is talking about is a track maintaince base of some sort, complete with a rail spur and track machinery. I have no idea how or why its there though.
The building that the CP is in Cudahy is the old Northern Rail Car building. Owned by Bill Gardner before he owned the Wisconsin Southern. In fact they had an SW-1 switcher. It was interesting to see what passenger cars and some locomotives would be going in and out. However when Gardner purchased the WSOR, Northern Rail Car moved to the north side of Milwaukee near 37th and Villard and of course is now closed. But shortly after that the CP moved in. And when needed the UP will switch cars for the CP.
Thanks for the answers! What was the building’s heritage before Northern Railcar owned it?
OK, now I’ll make it more interesting… a little further south along the same UP line is another shop-type facility named Cudahy Car Shop(s?), at 5000 South Whitnall Avenue. They even have a neat little sign out front, complete with railroad parts! What is the history behind this one?
Well I know that the Cudahy Car Shops have pretty much always been the Cudahy Car Shops. At one time the shops were run by the Chicago Northwestern. Apparently they did alot of work on reefers for Patrick Cudahy. When the railroad wanted to close it some employees or past employees bought and now do contract work for the railroad. The Cudahy Car shops are probably the main reason that the “Cudahy Job” local out of Mitchell Yard still runs everyday.
Heritage on the CP Rail building is that in the late 1950’s Milwaukee Crane built that building as their North Plant. Prior to that they just had the plant on the south side of the street. I got this information from ny Dad who was working at Milwaukee Crane at the time. So before Northern Rail Car it was Milwaukee Crane North Plant.