WP/UP Merger Question

[Kevin C. Smith]

Thank you! I've been racking my brains (what's left of them, anyway) trying to remember the name...off to Old Thread Land!

[ericsp]

SP bought Cotton Belt to get around the Santa Margarita Agreement (Ogden Gateway Agreement). There have been a few threads about that. Also, if you have the March 2005 issue of Trains, read "And Then The Golden Empire Came Crashing Down."

[Kevin C. Smith]

I was reading the Perlman article in the September Trains and a sentance caught my eye, "In 1982 the Union Pacific, which was being stiff-armed by the Southern Pacific at the Ogden Gateway, bought the Western Pacific in order to gain access to the central California market." I can't remember the name of the agreement but wasn't the SP was required to hand off some of it's traffic (40%?) to to UP? Was that agreement still in force in 1982? If so, the situation it strikes me that compared to the WP, the SP would have been able to originate a lot more traffic to send to the UP-even if only a portion went to the Overland Route. (Well, that shows why I'm not a RR consultant!) Wouldn't the SP be able to originate much more carload traffic than the WP? Was the SP sending import containers all the way 'round via the Golden State route from Oakland to the east?