Trackage rights

[lyctus]

Carl Swanson talks about trackage rights in the April MR which I found useful (being some 10,000 miles from nearest US railhead) but the discussion concentrated on freight traffic. What was the occurrence of foreign passenger trains on, say, Pennsy track ? Did, say, a NYC train run over PRR rails and did such a train terminate at a PRR terminal or station ? Or other situations like that, on other roads ?

[cacole]

In the days when U.S. railroads had passenger trains, they ran almost exclusively on their own trackage. There were a few exceptions, of course, but as a general rule the Pennsylvania Railroad, as an example, would not even create a passenger service to anywhere that they didn't have their own track.

A couple of exceptions involved trains that were handled by two or more roads -- such as the California Zephyr that ran from Chicago, Illinois to Oakland, California. The Chicago, Burlington & Quincy operated the train from Chicago to Denver, Colorado. The Denver & RIo Grande took it from Denver to Salt Lake City, Utah, where the Western Pacific took over for the remainder of the trip.

The Illinois Central's City of Miami from Chicago, Illinois to Miami, Florida was handled by the IC, Southern Railway, and Florida East Coast because IC trackage didn't run eastward.

And all railroads allowed other lines to route trains over their trackage during an emergency. I remember seeing many different passenger trains on the Illinois Central line in southern Illinois that were from other railroads that had been rerouted because of a derailment, flooding, tornado, etc.

Amtrak took over passenger rail service in the U.S. in 1971. Except for the Northeast Corridor trackage from Washington, D.C. to Boston, Massachusetts, practically all Amtrak trains run on other lines' trackage.

[tomikawaTT]

In the 1950's, UP's streamliners reached Chicago over other railroads, since UP's tracks ended in Nebraska. Those other lines provided the operating crews, and also had rolling stock in the pool from which those trains were made up. (The City of San Francisco reached the Bay over SP tracks at the same time, for the same reason. UP didn't have any trackage in that part of California.)

Also, some roads had through sleeper arrangements, so armour yellow UP sleepers sometimes ended up in PRR's Sunnyside Yard after de-training their occupants at New York City's Pennsylvania Station. I cannot say of my own knowledge whether or not tuscan red PRR cars were ever seen in Los Angeles.

[jrbernier]

Trackage Rights for passenger trains was quite common. The GN, NP, CB&Q, & CGW all used GN trackage between St Paul and Mpls, and the GN depot in Mpls. The Rock Island, a Soo used Milw trackage and depot in Mpls. The Rock Island used joint trackage in Southern Minnesota and Northern Iowa with the CGW and the M&StL.

Jim Bernier

[RedGrey62]

To add onto jrbernier's post, the CB&Q would pull GN's Empire Buider and NP's North Coast Limited into Chicago from Minneapolis-St Paul with its own E units.

Additionally, the Rock Island and CB&Q ran a joint train from Minneapolis to St Louis (IIRC). Normally pulled by one or ther other's locomotives, but the cars would be mix and match.

Rick

[Gluefinger]

Don't forget stations as well. C&O used North Western Station in Chicago after Grand Central was torn down.

[jecorbett]

QUOTE: Originally posted by lyctus

Carl Swanson talks about trackage rights in the April MR which I found useful (being some 10,000 miles from nearest US railhead) but the discussion concentrated on freight traffic. What was the occurrence of foreign passenger trains on, say, Pennsy track ? Did, say, a NYC train run over PRR rails and did such a train terminate at a PRR terminal or station ? Or other situations like that, on other roads ?

Unlikely you would see NYC passenger trains on PRR tracks given that they were arch rivals especially on the NY-Chicago corridor. The 20th Century Limited and the Broadway Limited were the flagship trains between those two cities and both competed strongly for customers. Each had their own branches to other major cities in the midwest so there would be no reason to use the others rails. All that changed when the two merged into the Penn Central in the 1960s in an effort to survive, later being absorbed into Conrail.

[Anonymous]

QUOTE: Originally posted by Gluefinger

Don't forget stations as well. C&O used North Western Station in Chicago after Grand Central was torn down.

Sure you don't mean B&O? C&O used Central Station not Grand Central Station.
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