Did great northern railroad, northern pacific railway, and the milwaukee road share train yards? I am modeling the great northern railroad, northern pacific railway, and the milwaukee road in one layout.
Quick answer would be “no” AFAIK.
You might find a situation where one railroad would have trackage rights over the other, but not sharing yards. In downtown St.Paul MN the three railroads all used St.Paul Union Depot, but used different lines to get there (the Milwaukee used the Milwaukee Road depot in Minneapolis, while GN and NP used the Great Northern depot, and crossed the Mississippi on different bridges). But each had their own coach yards.
You might find a situation where two of the railroads had yards that were next to each other, or end-to-end, and might from a railfan point of view look like one big railyard. In Minneapolis Northern Pacific’s Northtown yard and the Soo Line’s Shoreham Yards are very close to each other. The NP and Soo had a joint iron ore operation on Minnesota’s Cuyuna Iron Range; in Superior WI the Soo and NP had yards that were next to each other.
The Milwaukee did share yards in Ottumwa with the Wabash and in Kansas City with the KCS. I don’t believe the shared freight facilities with the NP or GN.
You would find both Great Northern and Milwaukee Road (not sure about the Northern Pacific) dropping off or picking up cars from the Minnesota Transfer Railway yards by Midway in the Twin Citiees.
The Minnesota Transfer Railway was a terminal railroad jointly owned by nine class 1 railroads in the Twin Cities. They had large warehouses for less than carload freight, seved some local industries, and was an interchange point for the owner railroads.
Their Midway yard was fairly large - it had 20 crews working there on an average day, in seven yards within the yard complex:
Midway yard complex consisted of no less than seven yards, being worked by about 20 engines on a normal day:
- C yard - 27 tracks, westbound arrival tracks
- J yard - 13 tracks, cars bound for local industries on the MTRY
- P yard - 29 tracks, eastbound arrival, departure & classification tracks
- A yard - 42 tracks, westbound classification & departure tracks
- B yard - 8 tracks, arrival/departure tracks
- F yard - storage tracks
- R yard - RIP tracks
The various railroads dropping off and picking up cuts of cars from the yards like this:
| Railroad | Drops off | Picks up |
|---|---|---|
| Milwaukee Road | C yard | C yard |
| Rock Island | C yard | C yard |
| Minneapolis & Saint Louis | A yard | A yard |
| Great Northern | P yard | A yard |
| Great Western | C yard | B yard |
| Omaha Road (C&NW) | C yard | B yard (eastbound), A yard (westbound) |
Smile,