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[quote user="VerMontanan"][quote user="futuremodal"][quote user="nanaimo73"][quote user="futuremodal"]  Remember also that Pipestone Pass proper is about 100' higher in elevation than Elk Park Pass, so the argument that the Milwaukee would have experienced steeper grades over Elk Park than Pipestone doesn't wash.   Since Elk Park Pass is actually lower than Pipestone, there is no logic to assume a Milwaukee line over Elk Park Pass to have 2.2% grades both ways compared to Pipestone's 1.66% and 2.0%. [/quote]I believe the line at Elk Park was higher than Pipestone-6,360' -Elk Park Pass, 6,347' -Pipestone Pass, 6,328' -Homestake Pass [/quote]Elk Park Pass proper is actually lower than Pipestone.  The summit tunnel for the line across Pipestone makes the Milwaukee line slightly lower than the GN line over Elk Park.From the highway atlas:  Elk Park - 6368'Pipestone - 6453'[/quote] But Nanaimo's premise is still valid.  Homestake is lower than them both, so therefore should have had the best gradient, but it didn't.  It was just as bad as Elk Park, and Pipestone was better.  And like Elk Park, Homestake didn't require a tunnel on top.  The reality is that other factors were likely involved such as: The MILW over Pipestone was built later than the NP over Homestake, so engineering and construction techniques were more advanced; or, that the NP main freight route was through Helena (where Mullan Pass had only a 1.4 percent grade eastbound), so they didn't feel the need to expend extra capital when a superior alternative route was already in place, whereas for the Milwaukee, this was their lone crossing of the Divide, and it benefitted them to make the grade as slight as possible.[/quote]Homestake has a very rough geology on it's eastside (as witnessed by the overabundance of curvature and the multitude of mini-tunnels along the present embargoed line), whereas Elk Park has that nice long straight valley to the summit out of the river canyon.  Clearly, Homestake is much worse than Elk Park and the rest from a difficulty perspective.BTW - As for the "what if" aspects, that is the whole premise of the topic.
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