What can anybody tell me about the Twin Cities & Western Railroad ? I have been to their web site but what are your opinions on this rail road and their future ?
I can tell you first hand I think the TC&W actually has a really bright future. I used to work for them for several years, and they always seemed to do a really wonderful job in aquiring new business, commiting to it, and keeping it. There are several websites also to learn more about this company. http://finance.groups.yahoo.com/group/TwinCitiesandWestern/ is the Yahoo site for the TC&W. http://www1.webng.com/tcwr/ is Mike Bargmann’s excellent TC&W fan site, but it is currently down. Mike would be the best expert on this railroad, as I remember him as a teenager riding his bike down to watch us switch at Chanhassen or at Hopkins.
The TC&W uses alot of run-through power now from my understanding from unit trains handed off from the UP and BNSF, as well as their very clean own units.
Mike is now a Conductor with CP in St. Paul, MN.
The TC&W, with its’ subsidiaries the Red River Valley & Western and the Minnesota Prairie Line, run a real tight ship from what I’ve seen. I’ve been impressed with the upkeep of their ROW and their locomotive power. I’ve not seen a lot of run-through power when I’ve been out to see them - I’ve only seen the Caterpillar-powered Geeps and the occasional CF7. The locomotives look very well maintained, and I’ve seen plenty of evidence that they’re doing track improvements over a lot of their property (I’ve never followed it further west than Danube). I get out to see them at least two or three times a year.
Take the Minnesota Prairie Line for example: You follow the old M&StL west out of Norwood/Young America and in just about every small town along the line I’ve seen hoppers and box cars on sidings, spotted for loading/unloading. That line hadn’t seen, from what I’ve been told, the kind of quality rail service now being provided by MPL in the past 20 years. I spoke to a number of co-op people in Fairfax this last winter, and they had nothing but good things to say about the MPL. I hear there’s a new ethanol plant coming on-line at Winthrop that will also be served by the MPL.
There’s plenty of business for the TC&W coming out of the beet plant at Reubel, and there seems to always be a lot of covered hoppers beling loaded in Olivia and Hector.
On a minor detail, I noticed that the TC&W has kept the same MILW-style design for their switchstand targets when they’ve replaced them. The new TC&W targets are constructed with reflective red & white stripes on the upside-down “arrow” target that’s classic MILW. Since there are so many of the MILW stands remaining, they decided to stick with the design, which I think is neat.