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Empire Builder moved to a more southerly route?
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[quote user="kenneo"] <p>Split the westbound Builder at Williston sending a "complete train" West on the Highline and another one up the Yellowston from Snowdon, MT, through Sidney to Glendive and thence West on the old NP and MRL. At Williston, each train would combine for the run East - or the Yellowstone section would terminate and transfer its passengers to the Builder. Westbound, the Builder would follow its current route to Spokane (GN) and the Yellowstone would follow its own schedule West to Portland. If scheduling permits, you could have your two-train swap at Spokane.</p><p>There will be congestion problems East of Laural with coal trains.</p><p>The MRL is Class 4 single track CTC, good for 79 MPH where not curve limited.</p><p>As for Spokane loadings, AMTK does not have the equipment to do what needs to be done to garner traffic. It needs four coaches and four or more sleepers to load about 9 PM, bed down the passengers, and the appropriate trains would pick them up.</p><p>It wouldn't happen (I don't think), but operating the Yellowstone connection East on the MILW with a connection from Terry (or Miles City) up to the High Line would provide a very direct connection to the Twin Cities and much better connections East. The Yellowstone connection would not need to be operated to Chicago. If this were to be done, each train could operate "independently" so that the arrivals and departures at each end and with any connections mid-route could be scheduled to maximize traffic.</p><p>Another suggestion would be to turn the Yellowstone connection South at the Twin Cities to Saint Louis.</p><p>Does AMTK have sufficient Heritage equipment in good repair to fill out a train such as we are talking about in this thread? I doubt it, but if so, with a couple of Domes, ... ... ... .</p><p>Dave's suggestion of operating down the UP from Silverbow to Los Angeles is a service that appears to fill a need. It would need to operate from Great Falls to Helena, West to Garrison and back to Silverbow (Butte), and South to Idaho Falls, Pocatello, Salt Lake, Reno and Los Angeles. Salt Lake to Los Angeles hosted the Desert Wind which made connections with the Zepher and the Pioneer at Salt Lake. You could travel from Seattle to Los Angeles with a change of trains at Salt Lake about as fast as via San Francisco. </p><p>[/quote]</p><p>I still favor getting rid of the Portland/Seattle split in Spokane. Just head on to one or the other and let the I-5 train take up the slack.</p><p>A longer split to allow Montana to have it's cake and eat it too just doesn't seem logistically possible, nor is the extra equipment available. Just keep the EB intact from Seattle to Chicago via Stampede Pass, Missoula, Billings, Bismark, Fargo, Twin Cities.</p><p>An I-15 train should probably run from Calgary (in conjuction with VIA) to LA. Too bad BNSF embargoed the Helena/Great Falls line. How about running from Calgary over Crownest via Eastport down to Sandpoint, then via MRL from Sandpoint through Missoula down to Silver Bow, then via UP the rest of the way via Pocatello, SLC, Vegas, to LA?</p>
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