The Chicago Great Western Railway

Trains Magazine General Discussion
41

Ed, Railswest, and others:

Ed, thanks for those comparisons from the Moody’s manuals; I discovered those publications in the Duluth Public Library back in the late 1960s and early 1970s and found they were a wealth of information. Besides the obvious financial statistics, there was an abundance of information on mileages owned and operated, breakdown of freight car types, descriptions of equipment trusts and conditional sales agreements for acquisition of locomotives and freight cars, and detailed listings of trackage rights over other railroads.

The CGW entry mentioned that they had trackage rights into every endpoint terminal and had high fixed charges as a result. These trackage rights agreements had both a fixed “rental” component which the tenant railroad had to pay regardless of traffic, and a lesser “wheelage” component based on locomotive and car miles or ton-miles. Considering the lighter density of CGW’s operations over these segments, those fixed components were spread over a small revenue base and took a correspondingly high chunk out of revenue.

We looked at the Kansas City lines trackage rights situation previously; now we’ll look at CGW’s operations in the Twin Cities area, which appeared to me as as their most expensive trackage rights arrangement, especially in view of the revenue generated.

As the Great Western headed north toward the Cities, it first went through South St. Paul where it it had a yard (later improved by CNW and still in operation today) which was originally owned by the St. Paul Bridge and Terminal (purchased by the CGW in the 1930s). Continuing north, the next yard was State Street Yard in St. Paul proper, smaller but the location of CGW’s roundhouse and loco servicing. North of there, the main line crossed the Mississippi River on the Robert Street Lift Bridge (a mostly deck girder affair with a truss vertical lift span). At the south end of the bridge was the American Hoist & Derrick plant, but CGW got no business there as it was served

42

Another interesting sidelight wrt the CGW was the actual location of the main shop and roundhouse complex in Oelwein. My Dad, who grew up south of Oneida (IA) on a farm that was seemingly distanced at the halfway point between the CGW and IC’s Iowa Division mainline, told me a story some years ago that, back in the day when CGW was planning to build a yard/shop complex in eastern Iowa, there was a huge debate about which town CGW would select to build the new complex and it came down between Oelwein and Oneida. I think he got the story from two uncles he had who worked for CGW - one was a locomotive engineer and the other worked at the roundhouse in Oelwein. Ultimately, of course, Oelwein won out.

While CGW probably couldn’t have made it in the long-run as a stand-alone entity, I do think that certain segments of CGW would still be here today had CNW not gobbled it up.

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Kurt:

Wow, what a spaghetti bowl of trackage.

Kurt, I am trying to picture all this, and without a visual impression of Twin Cities it is hard to do. What was the main terminal railroad in the Twin Cities, and I will see if the old Official Guides have a detailed map of the area. An OG from 1996 lists Minnesota Commerical Railway as the “only Industrial Switching Carrier”

The 1958 OG shows “Railway Transfer Company of The City of Minneapolis” but has no map. If nothing else, I will try to use Google Maps.

Stagner’s book has a few photos of the Twin Cities operations including the State Street engine terminal.

This railroad is an obvious example of the last railroad built…into nearly all markets. There was very little online business in Chicago area and it sounds as if they avoided most traffic in Twin Cities, relying on interchange for the most part.

My “journey” on the CGW, thru Stagner’s excellent book is now at Portage, Il. This is the junction of the CGW with the CB&Q and the IC. The three railroads parallel the Mississippi River into East Dubuque.

The photographs of the area are absolutely great. The area from Winston Tunnel to Dubuque is almost like a model railroad with tunnels, junctions, rivers, towers, and the great tunnel/crossing at East Dubuque.

One of the absolutely best railroad photographs I have ever seen is (actually two photos) is on page 53. Taken from a ridge overlooking the Mississippi River Valley, the panoramic view is incredible with CGW trains working past Portage Tower. Five tracks are in use and the CGW looks as if it could be running on the PRR on the mainline somewhere near Altoona. It is a stunning view of the railroad, when compared to the cornfields and small towns of typical CGW charactor.

What price would one pay to return to Portage Tower, circa 1950’s for a day of time travel and witness the great Burlington f

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Here’s an old photo of the CGW depot in Dubuque. By the size of it, I’m thinking it may have housed a division office.

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Ed, The Railway Transfer in Minneapolis was bought by the M&STL, It serviced grain mills next to the Mississippi river. (Gold Medal etc. etc. ) The track where so close together that no switchman could ride the side of a car, only 40 foot cars where allowed. I worked the afternoon shift one day and tied up the engine on the engine track, the next morning a train master called asking me why I didn’t report derailing the engine, during the night the engine feel off the track.

There was also a switching railroad that was next to the transfer. ( the name escapes me ) it was only 6 blocks long, it inter changed with the NP & GN. It had a engine house which is now a restaurant called 1st street station.

In the Twin Cities there where 4 CGW yards. ( So.St.Paul-State Street-Hoffman-Minneapolis South East ) A old timer told me once that during it’s prime the CGW had 75 switch jobs a day in the Twin Cities.

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75 per day! No wonder they had 4 yards.

The Dubuque station would not have been division … or at least I dont think so. Stockton, Il was the crew change and had a yard until 1950 or so.

Ed

47

An excerpt from Kurt’s description of the CGW in Minneapolis-St. Paul:

Since I’ve never explored the Twin Cities, I just spent a little time on-line searching out the CGW route Kurt described to us. Here is a aerial photo of St. Paul that shows the CGW coming into town from the south:

Aerial view of St. Paul (1953)

Here are a few pictures of the locations Kurt mentioned:

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I may be one of the only ones to actually remember the CGW – especially in steam days.

Here is a link to an article I wrote on my recollections:

Remembering the Chicago Great Western

Certainly operations on the Chicago division were way down in later years from my earliest remembrances.

Glen Brewer

Railroad Glory Days

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Nice vignettes of a boy along the tracks, Glen. I’m sure that lying in bed on a hot Illinois summer night with all the windows open, you would hear those 2-10-4 steam engines coming from miles away.

50

That ‘other’ switching operation in Mpls was the Minneapolis Eastern…

Jim

51

Hub City, Oelwein, Iowa, still has one spoke in use, Waterloo, Iowa to Oelwein, Iowa. Iowa Northern operates most if not all, ( UP I believe still operates Hiland Yard, to John Deere) serving Fairbank, Iowa’s ethanol Plant and the rail car rebuild plant in Oelwein. The Cedar River Bridge in Waterloo has been replaced after the flood of 08. The CGW track age now goes East after the river crossing on the old Rock Island Route to Cedar Rapids as the Iowa Northern. CGW track age was used to continue the Iowa Northern around Waterloo, along with old Waterloo, Cedar Falls and Northern RR (WCF&NRR) and Illinois Central track to return to Rock Island alignment .

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Although, Oelwein, Iowa, is a little out of the way, the Rail Road Museum is is a place to stop and take your grand kids to see and ride the pump hand car. They are good folks and worth the trip.

53

Glen:

I enjoyed reading your recollections.

Your one and only CGW photo is a dandy.

Ed

54

UP no longer operates that line between Waterloo and Oelwein. In October 2003, Iowa Northern Railway began freight operations it is now owned by D&W Railroad between Dewar and Oelwein and over incidental UP trackage rights between Waterloo and Dewar. Traffic consists of repaired freight cars, grain and chemical products.

56

I agree with your view. Let me add one thing. in 1966, there would be no rational basis for CGW’s management to even dream of the rail resurgence that happened decades later. In the 1960’s, the future would have looked pretty bleak, with continued losses of traffic and ultimate doom the only reasonable prospect, Faced with this prospect, and knowing that they were a weak player in the markets they served, a merger was the correct course. Further, had CGW not merged and survived until the 1980’s, it would have been killed by the demise of the “open routing” system (one of the byproducts of deregulat

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Falcon48

Your elaboration on my post is what was on my mind when I made the comments. It seems even now, few know how betterment account allowed railroads to show a profit.

58

Redundant, round about, and the longest distance between points of importance as end points and gateways. The Chicago Great Western is none the less an interesting case point of past tense study and what if speculation.

59

When was the line from Rochester, Stewartville, Racine, Spring Valley and southward built? I lived on a farm 3 miles due west from Racine but only got to see rare trains in the 70s when we drove along the line. We moved in 81 before I had a drivers liscence and the ability to hop in a car/truck and go chase trains.

60

It’s very hard to find detailed route maps of this RR line. I bet the Ziprail advocates are considering part of the old ROW along HWY 52.