Saw this in youtube thought I would post as I never would suspect this would happen but I guess EL might have been power short at the time......
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QwCAHh1BgEI
EL had a power pool with MILW at the time. EL units were usually GP35s and C425s.
John G. Kneiling once made a heretical proposal that MILW and EL should shuck their common-carrier obligations and become a coast-to-coast conveyor belt for intermodal. It would never have happened, given the regulatory climate, but it sure would have been interesting to watch.
But Erie and Milwaukee were weak roads and suffering during the 70's, EL was dealing with the aftermath of Hurricane Ages. MILW was trying to dump the PCE or at most thier whole railroad on BN, who did not really care about MILW in the first place. Would a combined EL-MILW merger really work? I heard MILW tried to merge with RI in 1959, but Mr Henry Crown pulled the plug.
Didn't MILW and CNW attempt a merger sometime in the 60's? Does anyone know the story behind this?
ATSFGuy But Erie and Milwaukee were weak roads and suffering during the 70's, EL was dealing with the aftermath of Hurricane Ages. MILW was trying to dump the PCE or at most thier whole railroad on BN, who did not really care about MILW in the first place. Would a combined EL-MILW merger really work? I heard MILW tried to merge with RI in 1959, but Mr Henry Crown pulled the plug. Didn't MILW and CNW attempt a merger sometime in the 60's? Does anyone know the story behind this?
[from Wiki] "in 1969 the ICC effectively blocked the merger with the Chicago and North Western Railway (C&NW) that the Milwaukee Road had counted on and had been planning for since 1964. The ICC asked for terms that the C&NW was not willing to agree to. The merger of the "Hill Lines"— was approved at around the same time, and the merged Burlington Northern came into being."
Agree with what Charlie Hebdo said. The Milwaukee actually made money through 1975 though it was not enough to be sustainable but it was enough to continue to operate and order equipment. The problem with the Milwaukee was NOT the Pacific Coast Extension. It was the multiple branch lines the railroad had in the Midwest and Prarie States. In comparison any loss on the PCE was a minor *** of a pin. Additionally, past bankruptcy trustees carried almost 100% of the debt of the PCE on the books through several bankruptcies, the first bankruptcy after the PCE was built they should have given bond holders a serious haircut and reduced the PCE debt. Instead they carried it forward in a naive hope that it could be paid off. It was several hundred millions of dollars back then and anyone applying time value of money analysis on that lump sum could have calculated it would be a financial albatross on the company and cause further bankruptcies............and it did.
The Milwaukee should have more robustly abandon granger lines in the 1920's and 1930's after merging one granger after another. Instead it kept them as did the C&NW. The biggest benefit of the C&NW-Milwaukee Merger would have been consolidation of mainlines and traffic and wholesale abandonment of Midwestern and Prairie branch lines. Had they been able to achieve that they could have probably kept the PCE post merger and been fairly strong financially.
Just looking at the Milwaukee Road across Wisconsin they had a former mainline between Brookfield, Wi and Mississippi River at Praire Du Chien which they downgraded to branch. Former Mainline that headed North via Ripon, etc to Portage, New Mainline built between Milwaukee and Watertown which they later merged with Watertown and LaCrosse Railroad...........which forms the basis of what CP uses now. So thats four tracks almost all of which reached to the Mississippi river over various routes. Just that alone was a huge investment. Not even looking at how many lines they had extending into Mid to Northern Wisconsin (3 more). So Milwaukee was tremendously overbuilt in the Midwest and Prarie states compared to their single track with few branch lines off of it to Seattle.
Northwestern similar issues, 2 Chicago to Milwaukee mainline routes which UP still operates today. 2 Milwaukee to Green Bay routes which UP operates only a small fraction of. One of the Green Bay routes extended further to Ashland, WI (Lake Superior) which C&NW was looking to use as a port I believe and the port never developed.....much like Port Charlotte, FL and CSX. I think Milwaukee to Sheboygan is all UP has left and the rest is bike path or WSOR.
Milwaukee started making a profit again in 1982 but stayed under the Bankruptcy Trustee until 1986, it was the trustee that sold the railroad to the Soo Line after rejecting several Milwaukee Road reorg plans including the last called Milwaukee II that would have kept a mainline all the way to Miles City, MT
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