Ok Realy Stupid Question. Will the UP ever plan on Abandoning the Blair line someday for a much better Route? Allan.
While I can’t answer your direct question I thought I would share an old saying…“THE ONLY DUMB QUESTION IS THE ONE YOU DON’T ASK!”
The UP will keep the line via Blair for the foreseeable future. They would love to double track the line if they could justify the brige expense across the Missouri at Blair.
Thank you very much Bobwilcox.
The line through Blair is considerably shorter, distance-wise, than heading south at Mo Valley and going through Council Bluffs and Omaha, then back northwestward to Fremont. In premerger days, CNW didn’t have the shortest route between Chicago and Omaha, but it was definitely the shortest route between Chicago and anywhere west of Fremont. In these days of slower trains and parking lots on the main lines that may not seem significant, but it was definitely a competitive advantage back then.
Back when C&NW first started running the Falcon, Fremont was the interchange point because of the reasons mentioned above and because C&NW got a better share of the rate division by interchanging with UP at Fremont instead of Omaha.
Similarly, CB&Q/BN’s through freights to west of Omaha crossed the Missouri River at Pacific Junction and also avoided Omaha.
Thanks guys.
The div via Fremont was the same as via Omaha/C. Bluffs.
I beg to differ, “bobwilcox.” I seem to recall reading in either Info Magazine (a UPRR publication, now defunct) or in Trains Magazine that Union Pacific was willing to shave a little off of its rate division with the C.& N.W. in exchange for a faster routing via Missouri Valley - Blair - Fremont. The whole idea was to route the time-sensitive trailer and container traffic around the often congested Omaha/Council Bluffs terminal. Competition from either the BN to the Pacific Northwest or the Santa Fe to southern California prompted this action.
Ya but the only Train traffic that Omaha gets is nothing but Eastbounds from Fremont.
Other than,Train flows are pretty nill down there.
I don’t beleve the report. It must have been in Trains because INFO would have never talked about such a sensitive issue. I base my opion on working with the UP on soda ash, lumber and perishables during the 1970s. First, the transconental divisions were prescribed by the ICC. If you varied from them the FBI wolud come around for a visit. We could have asjusted the soda ash divisions but the UP never saw the benifit of giving up the money. In addition they were very concerned about giving the appearance of favoring one of thier IA line connections over the others.
Good question, not stupid.
I have the same question about Tenessee Pass and wonder what its current status is. Seems like a very viable alternative should UP experience another “meltdown” like it did back when it merged with SP and for a short time several routes were temporarily turned into freight train (and Amtrak) parking lots.
Some of the Tennessee Pass route is used by a shortline and by excursion trains west form Pueblo. The rest is morubund, but the UP is holding on to the property in case traffic requirement require its reactivation. I suspect this will occur when the “Joint Line” gets overloaded and some traffic from the Craig branch, mostly coal, (and line now goes well beyond Craig), that now goes south over the Joint Line (UP and BNSF Denver-Colorado Springs-Pueblo) will be diverted by going south via the Dotsero cutoff and the Tennessee Pass. One problem with that routing now (even Tennessee Passe were reactivated) is the lack of track capacity at Bond/Orestead, where the power would have to run around the train to reverse direction.