Does anybody have the latest up-to-date news on what’s happening to the old NWP north coast rail line? From what I’ve been able to learn, the hope that service will ever be restored on this line (Willits-Eureka) seems to be growing dimmer and dimmer.
Anybody know? Will any group rise up at the last minute and save this line? Sad fact is, once it’s gone it’s probably gone forever.
Regards,
Fred M. Cain,
Topeka, IN
Hi Fred, I live in Eureka. Right the NWP is leasing the southern portion of the line from the North Coast Rail Authority. Willits to Eureka will never happen. THe rail prism was never stable, and now, it has only grown even worse, especially through the Eel River Canyon. Tale a look on Google Earth. Between the cost and permitting, it just isnt feasible. In eureka, we have nothing to move to make a rail profitable. There is talk of an East West route. THrough mostly federal land. THe idea would be to improve the port at Humboldt Bay, and go east and connect with the national rail network in Red Bluff CA. THis is also highly unlikely.
Also, The California State Government created the North Coast Rail Authority years ago. With no funding. Recenlty a measure passed to essentially kill the NCRA, well…neuter it. THere focus is to examine the feasibility of turning the right of way into ‘the great redwood trail’ or something to that effect. THe trail is also unlikely as the right of way runs mostly through private property. LAnd owners dont mind a rail(active or not), but people walking throught the land, they are against.
So, in essence, barring a miracle, the line is dead. It would take billons of dollars and years to get the line open. and then, we still have no viable items to ship to support the rail. Lumber and gravel is all we have.
(1) Agreed that the Willits- Eureka portion is most likely dead. The Eel River and the tunnels are just too expensive to deal with … and no revenue stream.
(2) “Also, The California State Government created the North Coast Rail Authority years ago. With no funding. Recenlty a measure passed to essentially kill the NCRA, well…neuter it. THere focus is to examine the feasibility of turning the right of way into ‘the great redwood trail’ or something to that effect. THe trail is also unlikely as the right of way runs mostly through private property. LAnd owners dont mind a rail(active or not), but people walking throught the land, they are against.”
-The locals and the inept politicians have zero idea on how rails to trails works. When they bring in an outside consultant, they contract the cheapest and least experienced without doing adequate due dilligence - sad. The line has been embargoed or discontinuanced for over a decade. Also working against the railroad had been the awful leadership and staff (operating department in search of a disaster) and inbred callous workforce that just didn’t understand how to railroad, especially on a cash strapped insular shortline. Politics just made it worse. The well intensioned, lacking in resources and expertise folks from the Eureka Southern/ early NCRA days has been replaced by a bunch of inept political hacks totally out of touch with[sigh] the situation.
Dear “Heavy Feather”,
Thanks for the information! You know, I have had a tough time finding anything out about this. I have sent e-mails to the Eureka Chamber of Commerce, The North Coast Rail Authority, Train Riders of California and the Rail Passenger Association of Calif and nobody, absolutely NO ONE would even return an e-mail ! So, your response is much appreciated even though it is somewhat pessimistic.
Resumption of rail service to Eureka is admittedly a really long shot but I don’t think it should be completely dismissed altogether. You cited most but perhaps not all of the obstacles involved with it but there are three things that give me a faint ray of hope that someday it might happen. I found these three by doing extensive Google News searches.
First and foremost of all is that there is a genuine interest in the Humboldt Bay area in bringing rail service back the area. That’s a start. The fact that they would even discuss a possible east-west line reveals this interest. (Personally, I suspect a new east-west line to Redding is an even longer shot that a possible rebuilding of the old line).
Second is the fact that California today has become a very pro-rail state. The building of the high-speed rail line in the Central Valley is evidence of this as is the development of the Capital, Surf and San Joaquin passenger corridors.
Last but not least is the fact that Caltrans has it in their long-ter
“Mudchicken”,
As “Heavy Feather” pointed out, the NCRA was charged with the responsibility of reopening the rail line but give no funding. How stupid could that be? In a way, this is similar to the way that the U.S. Congress established Amtrak. They were given the responsibility of taking over what was left of the Nation’s passenger trains but then provided with as little funding as possible.
What really needs to happen here is that people living in Calfornia who want to see the line rebuilt need to organize and exert pressure on the politicians. Make no mistake about it. The “Friends of the Eel River” are well organized. That might be why we rail advocates lost this fight. Er, well, lost round one anyhow.
I don’t understand the rationale of spending untold millions of dollars building a trail then give a million dollar a year (or more) budget to maintain the trail that can only be used by cyclists. Seems like a rail line would benefit more people. Most ideal would be BOTH a rail line and a trail side-by-side.
Lumber won’t provide much of a future for the line anymore, true. But containers and export grain just might. I’d even venture to say export coal but I wouldn’t wanna let the environmentalists in on that. Better to just leave the coal alone for the time being.
Some future North Coast Daylight service for tourists would also be really nice. Am I dreaming here? Maybe. But some dreams come true. I once had a dream that streetcars might someday return to some of our important cities. People thought I was crazy and I even kinda dismissed the possibility myself as only dream. Guess what? Dare to dream!
Basically it might someday come down to this. In regards to environmentalism, do we add more lanes to U.S. 101 or do we rebuild a rail line?
Regards,
Fred M. Cain
Do we realy need another port option? One at the end of a long branch line? Consolidation of ports seems to be what is happening.
(1) The pressures of expanding US-101 have been out there for a good while, plus the bypasses. (Look at how long Willits [BH’s hometown] and Cloverdale took)
(2) Both sides of the argument deserve each other. Competence is not to be found on either side.
(3) As far as railroad and trail co-existing - nope. There are just too many out there that won’t respect the operating railroad. (Still watching what’s going on in the tunnels on the other end of NWP.) Demographics will continue to change, but folks will still have little control of the bad actors, especially in the great granola bowl.
(4) As far as the dreamers and visionaries go, how’s that experiment of 'build the train station first and they will come" working out?
Yes, I think so but of course neither of us can prove this one way or the other. First of all, the Trump tariffs not withstanding, things seem to be moving in the direction of increased international trade. The other thing is that although a Far East - Humboldt Bay would be somewhat longer sailing than the ports in SeaTac or Vancouver, it would still be shorter than the Far East to Oakland or Long Beach. The Kansas City Southern is trying to develop a new port on the west coast of Mexico which would mean even longer sailing time. (About a whole day, actually from LA).
The other point is that with the lumber industry in near death throws there is strong support in the Humboldt Bay area for doing this. This could provide jobs and really help boost the local economy. But unloading containers and trucking them down U.S. 101 to the S.F. Bay area or (really scary) sending them east over California 299 would be completely uncompetitive.
I don’t know but I have come to suspect something. This whole plan to build a new line directly from Eureka to the UP’s I-5 corridor line might just be a move in order to spark the State
It’ll never happen. Not only would the rail line have to be completely rebuilt, but it would have to be expanded and made more heavy duty. Then, you have to build the whole port infrastructure and build highways for the intermodal trucks. Meanwhile, SF and LA have more than enough capacity.
Mudchicken,
Well, yeah, I think those are good points but I especially like your point #@.
Regards
Fred M. Cain
Never say never! But then again if you say “Never say never” then you have already said it! 
Regards,
FMC
Did some more “flying” today and even found some interesting Google Earth “street views”. What I’m seeing now more and more is that the biggest issue is going to be brush removal. That’s what I’m seeing. Near the northern part of the line as it approaches Eureka, there are even redwoods growing right next to or even in the tracks. Many people assume that since a redwood can live to be 2,000 years old that they must grow very slowly. Not so. Redwoods are very fast growers when they’re young. 20 years of no brush and tree removal has indeed taken its toll.
Once again, the impression that I get is that the total percentage of road that has been either washed away or destroyed in landslides is really quite small if not tiny.
To rebuild the line, the greatest expenditure will be the brush removal and tie replacement.
Now, I do not know when the Google Earth images were actually shot. I was able to “stand” on one bridge and look out over the track. On one side of the bridge the track had very nearly disappeared in the brush and weeds but on the other side of the bridge it was really clean. Obviously those two images were not taken at the same time.
Regards,
Fred M. Cain
Well, the port of Humboldt Bay is a full day closer to Asian markets than the other ports in California. But, it would need to be developed and dregged regularly.
THe folks who think the rail can return are a fairly small minority locally. THe irony is that the people who are against the rail are largerly ‘environmentalists’. THey seem to have a pretty shortsighted view and dont consider how much more environmentally friendly shipping by rail is than shipping by truck.
There is currently a significant trail project around Humboldt Bay. THe rail is not being removed, and in some instances, the rail prism is being repaired as the trail goes in along the right of way. THe idea here is to have a scenic railway around Humboldt Bay for locomotives, but in the near term, llikely just speeder cars.
You can ‘google’ the Humboldt Eastern Railrailroad for a pretty good breakdown of the East West innitiative. It has been fairly widely mocked here locally.
We don’t need another port on the west coast. The “day quicker” to NE Asia is lost with an extra day on the rail. There is near zero on line traffic. There is near zero passenger potential account of low population. There are plenty of far more urgent needs in California for rail capital dollars, e.g. Altamont Pass, LAUS, and miles of single track where there should be double, and where there is a real need. I suggest that anyone wanting to reopen the line should get a stout pair of boots and go walk it. Brush clearance!!
PD
You know, Feather, I had an interesting e-mail exchange with someone from the “Friends of the Eel River”. I tried to point out exactly what you’re saying. They want to protect the salmon in the river (a worthy goal) but I tried to point out all the toxins and garbage that must wash off of U.S. 101 in the rainy season. A rail line is far, far more environmentaly “friendly”.
At the end, although he (or she) wouldn’t admit it, I felt like I gave them something to think about.
Regards,
Fred M. Cain
In reality, a lot more people use US101 in that area than would ever use a train.
Sadly, what doesn’t show up in a a “flyover” are the collapsed tunnels on the south end of the Eel valley, the washed-out/subsided fills and twenty-plus year of no maintenace on the bridges and culverts. In addition, the track structure would need to be raised and re-ballasted, and a replacement of at least two-thirds of the ties would be necessary on the OOS service portion. All of this would take place in a remote and difficult-to-access location. And - this is Cali, not Texas - the environmental obstacles would be considerable (and expensive).
It absolutely can be done, and I would first in line to pay to ride the result. The cost just to put the road in serviceable condition would be in the neighborhood of ten thousand dollars per carload for years to come - without considering landowner litigation, the cost to build a container port in Humbolt Bay to service today’s container ships, and the railroad’s operating costs.
Moreover - the difficulty in working with the powerful West Coast port unions is such that I expect a big chunk of the “inland containers” (those moved far inland for unloading vs. being drayed to a network of port-area “break-bulk” warehouses) to relocate to Mexico or the US East/Gulf Coast. Look what happened in Oregon a couple of years ago - arguements and the endless job actions between the electricans and the longshoremen unions over who plugged in refrigerated containers drove container traffic completely out of the Port of Portland. [:|]
The fact that container business can be handled without even the need to use Portland, says there is no economic reason to build a new port on Humboldt Bay.
Also, with a current area population of only 80K, there’d have to be a large population increase if the port was going to be of any useful size.
Poppulation of the COunty is 137k. 25k in Eureka, and another 15k or so in Arcata.
I agree…we dont need a rail here. but it would sure be nice. Whenever I leave the county, I am always excited to see trains. Oh, I forgot…we have four GP9’s stuck in Eureka…they count, right?