Montana Coal and the Milwaukee Road

[gabe]

All of this recent, and excellent, discussion about the Milwaukee Road prompted me to get out some maps and examine the line a bit more closely last night. A few questions:

(1) I once remember someone saying something to the effect of "had Montana's coal been in Oklahoma rather than Montana the CB&Q would have gone the way of the Rock and the Rock would have done quite well.

I know that the majority of Montana coal is in the Powder River Basin, but I don't know the full geographic extent of this basin. So, did the Milwaukee Road's Pudget Sound extension come anywhere close to this coal, and if so, how close was the Milwaukee Road to missing the traffic boom, and finally, could this coal have saved the Milwaukee Road?

(2) How did the Milwaukee Road get into Seatle. My map showed the line stopping just south of it.

(3) There is a substantial portion of Milwaukee Road track west of Seatle, that goes to Tacoma (I think I remember that right). This wasn't contiguous to the Milwaukee Road track. How did the Milwaukee Road reach it? Was this pretty much branck line traffic, or was it considered part of the main?

(4) My map was just before WWII. But I noticed there were several segments of line that were not contiguous to the main line. Does anyone know if these were once contiguous but the Milwaukee Road abandoned portions of the branch and used traffic rights to reach them?

(5) Did the Milwaukee Road use a ferry system to reach some of its lines around Pudget Sound?

Thanks,

Gabe

[Anonymous]

Re: 1. I vaguely recall the Milwaukee did originate a unit coal train from Montana to a utility at the South Dakota/Minnesota border. Something like that. The hoppers had lids that would swing open as the train was loading. Don't know if this service is still in effect.

[jeaton]

Gabe,
I have the 1921 Federal Valuation Maps which provide should provides the answers, but FIRST DDHS Vs. Cambridge HS Soccer. I'll get back later.

Jay

[Anonymous]

Gabe,

1. As tomtrain pointed out, the Milwaukee did run Montana coal to eastern South Dakota. It was this portion of the Milwaukee Pacific Coast Extension (from Terry MT acress South Dakota to Milbank) that was purchased by the state of South Dakota, and later sold to BNSF for continuation of this unit train activity.

If you don't have a rail atlas, you can somewhat retrace the Milwaukee's route across South Dakota and Montana by following U.S. Highway 12 in your road atlas. The Milwaukee route near Roundup MT comes real close to the Bull Mountain Mine which BNSF recently helped reopen. As far as I know, the Milwaukee never built a branch line into the PRB coal fields. If they had, they might still be alive today assuming they could have stayed around past 1980. PRB coal might not have saved the line to the Puget Sound, but it would have kept the company independent until it's inevitable merger with UP or BNSF.

2., 3., 4., and 5. When the Milwaukee came into the Puget Sound area, they obtained trackage rights over an existing railroad (I can't find my copy of "Milwaukee Road West" otherwise I could tell you!) They followed the Cedar River valley into Renton WA. The line split at Renton, the north line into Seattle and the South line down to Tacoma. They shared this line and passenger facilities in Seattle with the Union Pacific, right across from GN's/MP's King Street Station. The lines were all contiguous.

They had other trackage from Port Townsend to Port Angeles and a line from Bremerton (?) to the Canadian Border, both lines of which were reached by rail barge, and had obtained rights south as far as Longview WA. I'm not sure how much of this last line was Milwaukee trackage and how much was trackage rights. Someone else will have to fill us in.

[ericsp]

QUOTE: Originally posted by futuremodal

They had other trackage from Port Townsend to Port Angeles and a line from Bremerton (?) to the Canadian Border, both lines of which were reached by rail barge, and had obtained rights south as far as Longview WA.

It appears that Bremerton is either on the Olympia Peninsula or on an island between the Olympia Peninsula and Seattle. To get to Canada from there, you would have to go south through the city of Olympia then go north, across the Puget Sound then go north, or across the Strait of Juan de Fuca. Could it have been Bellingham?

[Anonymous]

QUOTE: Originally posted by ericsp

QUOTE: Originally posted by futuremodal

They had other trackage from Port Townsend to Port Angeles and a line from Bremerton (?) to the Canadian Border, both lines of which were reached by rail barge, and had obtained rights south as far as Longview WA.

It appears that Bremerton is either on the Olympia Peninsula or on an island between the Olympia Peninsula and Seattle. To get to Canada from there, you would have to go south through the city of Olympia then go north, across the Puget Sound then go north, or across the Strait of Juan de Fuca. Could it have been Bellingham?

Yep, you're right, it is Bellingham, not Bremerton. My mistake.

[Anonymous]

Hello. As a former Milwaukee Road employee, I can add some information. The coal trains came from lignite mines at Gascoyne, North Dakota and went to a power plant near Milbank, South Dakota. While I was working in the division office in Aberdeen, we extended a number of sidings and did some work on the main track to prepare for the coal trains. I staked out the main line turnout at the power plant about 1973. We started running the trains about 1974.

I never worked on the west end and was not as familiar with it. I believe it as at Black River Junction where the line split to go to Seattle or Tacoma. As I recall we had a track to Longview, Washington. In the late 60's or early 70's we got trackage rights to Portland, over UP, I think.

[ericsp]

There was a thread where the cars that hauled the lignite were discussed. I think it was about rotary couplers.

[jeaton]

Gabe

Dave has this covered fairly well. I was trying to pull down some maps of the PRB that I could correlate with my MILW maps. It looks to me that the MILW swung over the northern end of the PRB and perhaps could have gone in there, but the timing was off.
PRB coal did not become attractive until the Clean Air Act, I think of the Mid '80s and by that time they were dust. Even if they had been able to hang on, they may have found themselves the third man in a two man game.

The trackage around Puget sound and to the west and south of Tacoma was a bit of a jumble of rights and joint trackage. For example Cedar Falls to Everett was MILW as was Cedar Falls to Maple Valley. Maple Vallely to Black River Jct was C&PS Ry (?&Puget Sound?) where it connected to the MILW owned to Seattle. The track south from Black River Jct to Tacoma Jct was joint owned with the OWRR& N Co. And so it goes. My charts show isolated trackage owned at Port Townsend, Eagle Harbor Port Blakeley and Bremerton, all appearantly served by car ferry.

The isolated Bellingham division consisted of 66.97 miles of main track and 24.13 other. Connections are shown and in addition to car ferry there could have been interchange with the GN at Bellingham and the CP and B.C. Electric Ry at the Canada Border. If they were getting a long haul off their lines up there or off the Canadian connections, I suspect that they would have had to move the traffic via car ferry. I would be surprised if GN would have allowed an open interchange for traffic from the MILW at Bellingham back to the MILW at Everett

I am sending you an Email on the source of this stuff.

Jay

[ericsp]

I saw a Milwaukee Road boxcar today.

[Anonymous]

I stumbled onto this wonderful website:

http://home.earthlink.net/~milwaukeeroadcoastdivisiondvd/

[athelney]

I believe the Milwaukee Road came up to the Canadian border interchange at Sumas WA . I seem to remember seeing an odd train there back in the mid 1970's when I first emigrated to Canada - although did not recognise the fact that they would soon be done away with . The border point is Sumas/ Huntingdon that joins up with the CP and what used to be BC Hydro railway .

[PNWRMNM]

Gabe,

Milw entry to Seattle was on the Pacific Coast Railroad/Railway, and a bit of UP to the depot. The Pacific Coast has a long and interesting history.

There is a recent excellent history of railroads serving Seattle by Kurt Armbruster but I can not recall the title.

Mac

[nanaimo73]

Thanks for the site tomtrain.[:)]

[MichaelSol]

Milwaukee Road purchased coal rights in 1906 in the Bull Mountains of Central Montana and operated the Republic Coal Co. near Roundup, Montana up until they sold the mines in 1954. Milwaukee Road's coal operations once produced nearly 30% of all coal produced in Montana.

This was supposed to be a very good quality bituminous coal, superior to the "brown dirt" that the NP mined at Colstrip. Aside from railroad service, Republic Coal offered a commercial service to various customers as well.

When the PCE was abandoned, one of the objections to abandonment was the loss of rail service to that large coal producing district at a key time in the national energy policy debate. As a result, coal development there has been hampered, but current projects are underway to exploit the old Milwaukee coal properties.

http://www.bullmountainenergy.com/Power/

This includes a new rail line, although I haven't heard anything about this project in quite some time.

Best regards, Michael Sol

[MP173]

That is one HECK of a website.

I looked at it for 15 minutes and was shocked to find 90 minutes had passed by. I learned far more about the demise of the Milwaukee Road in those 90 minutes than the other thread.

ed

[Murphy Siding]

QUOTE: Originally posted by cnwrwyman

Hello. As a former Milwaukee Road employee, I can add some information. The coal trains came from lignite mines at Gascoyne, North Dakota and went to a power plant near Milbank, South Dakota. While I was working in the division office in Aberdeen, we extended a number of sidings and did some work on the main track to prepare for the coal trains. I staked out the main line turnout at the power plant about 1973. We started running the trains about 1974.

I never worked on the west end and was not as familiar with it. I believe it as at Black River Junction where the line split to go to Seattle or Tacoma. As I recall we had a track to Longview, Washington. In the late 60's or early 70's we got trackage rights to Portland, over UP, I think.

How did the coal from Gascoyne get TO the Milwaukee lines? Over someone else's tracks, or over one of those branch lines into N.D. that were west of Mobridge?

Thanks

[nanaimo73]

QUOTE: Originally posted by Murphy Siding

QUOTE: Originally posted by cnwrwyman

Hello. As a former Milwaukee Road employee, I can add some information. The coal trains came from lignite mines at Gascoyne, North Dakota and went to a power plant near Milbank, South Dakota. While I was working in the division office in Aberdeen, we extended a number of sidings and did some work on the main track to prepare for the coal trains. I staked out the main line turnout at the power plant about 1973. We started running the trains about 1974.

I never worked on the west end and was not as familiar with it. I believe it as at Black River Junction where the line split to go to Seattle or Tacoma. As I recall we had a track to Longview, Washington. In the late 60's or early 70's we got trackage rights to Portland, over UP, I think.

How did the coal from Gascoyne get TO the Milwaukee lines? Over someone else's tracks, or over one of those branch lines into N.D. that were west of Mobridge?

Thanks

The Knife River mine in North Dakota is just off the mainline at mile 949.2
http://terraserver.microsoft.com/image.aspx?T=1&S=12&Z=13&X=813&Y=6387&W The Big Stone power plant started in 1975 north of Big Stone at mile 602.2
http://terraserver.microsoft.com/image.aspx?T=1&S=12&Z=14&X=868&Y=6274&W

[Murphy Siding]

QUOTE: Originally posted by nanaimo73

QUOTE: Originally posted by Murphy Siding

QUOTE: Originally posted by cnwrwyman

Hello. As a former Milwaukee Road employee, I can add some information. The coal trains came from lignite mines at Gascoyne, North Dakota and went to a power plant near Milbank, South Dakota. While I was working in the division office in Aberdeen, we extended a number of sidings and did some work on the main track to prepare for the coal trains. I staked out the main line turnout at the power plant about 1973. We started running the trains about 1974.

I never worked on the west end and was not as familiar with it. I believe it as at Black River Junction where the line split to go to Seattle or Tacoma. As I recall we had a track to Longview, Washington. In the late 60's or early 70's we got trackage rights to Portland, over UP, I think.

How did the coal from Gascoyne get TO the Milwaukee lines? Over someone else's tracks, or over one of those branch lines into N.D. that were west of Mobridge?

Thanks

The Knife River mine in North Dakota is just off the mainline at mile 949.2
http://terraserver.microsoft.com/image.aspx?T=1&S=12&Z=13&X=813&Y=6387&W The Big Stone power plant started in 1975 north of Big Stone at mile 602.2
http://terraserver.microsoft.com/image.aspx?T=1&S=12&Z=14&X=868&Y=6274&W

By Jiminy-there it is! I was thinkng Gascoyne was way up by Wiliston. After digging up a map, I see you're absolutely correct![:)]

[Anonymous]

Slightly off topic (but necessitated by the locking of the Milwaukee thread), was there ever any consideration given to daylighting Boylston tunnel? From the pictures it looks like there is relatively little in the way of overburden from the geographic summit to the railbed itself.

[arbfbe]

Some of the Bull Mountain coal has moved for export via the MRL. The coal is trucked to Lockwood, MT near Huntley Project where it is loaded into hopper cars for furthurence to Roberts Bank near Vancouver, BC. Currently the cogen power plant at Thompson Falls, MT is using a small supply of the coal to augment the burning of their wood chips. BNSF has a plan to construct a connection from their line at Broadview, MT to the mine should shipping quantities increase enough to warrant the expense of construction of the line. Some abandoned row exists at Broadview now.

Though this is high quality coal the mines are all underground and thus more costly to operate than the large open pit mines in the PRB.

MILW would have had two noteable options to tap the PRB Lignite coal if they had stayed in business. The most obvious would be construction of the planned Tongue River Railroad which would effectively short haul the CB&Q/NP routing of the BN for coal in the Decker, MT/Sheridan, WY area. This would follow the valley of the Tongue River south from the MILW mainline in the Miles City area. East of Miles City the MILW might have started construction on the abandoned right of way of the Wyoming - Montana North South Railroad which had plans to connect the Miles City area with central Wyoming and beyond. BN would have fought such incursion into their monopoly with vigor. This would have opened markets in the upper midwest and Kansas City to competition from the MILW. The southern end of the MILW service would have been at some disadvantage to the CB&Q routing via Lincoln, NE the BN enjoyed. I am sure the coal mines in the PRB and the power plants in the midwest would have been very supportive of an alternative MILW routing.

Thoughts for 09/14

Certainly the coal deposits are larger than just the Powder River Basin fields and indeed continue on north into Canada. Some of those areas straddling the MILW mainline could have been developed with the MILW becoming a major hauler to the upper midwest. Montana early on passed a coal severance tax to cushion itself against the boom and bust cycle of meneral production as well as to insure abandoned mines would be reclaimed when the wealth had been removed. The hard rock mining industry has left a long history of just walking away from toxic mine and mill sites leaving the state with tens of millions of dollars in work to do to make these sites safe again. Wyoming has not elected to impose this tax and their coal is more competitive in energy markets than Montana coal. This could have been a problem with coal along the MILW tracks.

[nanaimo73]

Dave-
I salvaged this thread before it expired. You can bring up any Milwaukee Road topic you want.

[Murphy Siding]

QUOTE: Originally posted by futuremodal

Slightly off topic (but necessitated by the locking of the Milwaukee thread), was there ever any consideration given to daylighting Boylston tunnel? From the pictures it looks like there is relatively little in the way of overburden from the geographic summit to the railbed itself.

Dave: I'm not really sure where the Boylston tunnel is, but reading about how money was spent for maintenance of snow sheds, if the tunnel was in a bad snowy area,maybe having a top was a "cheap" snow shed? Unless a tunnel is long enough to cause major smoke problems, what would be the advantage of daylighting a tunnel?

[kenneo]

QUOTE: Originally posted by Murphy Siding

QUOTE: Originally posted by futuremodal

Slightly off topic (but necessitated by the locking of the Milwaukee thread), was there ever any consideration given to daylighting Boylston tunnel? From the pictures it looks like there is relatively little in the way of overburden from the geographic summit to the railbed itself.

Dave: I'm not really sure where the Boylston tunnel is, but reading about how money was spent for maintenance of snow sheds, if the tunnel was in a bad snowy area,maybe having a top was a "cheap" snow shed? Unless a tunnel is long enough to cause major smoke problems, what would be the advantage of daylighting a tunnel?

Maintainence. Tunnels and bridges eat money faster then a 747 with indigestion.

[Murphy Siding]

Bridges I can see, but how does a tunnel eat up maintenance money?

[nanaimo73]

QUOTE: Originally posted by Murphy Siding

QUOTE: Originally posted by futuremodal

Slightly off topic (but necessitated by the locking of the Milwaukee thread), was there ever any consideration given to daylighting Boylston tunnel? From the pictures it looks like there is relatively little in the way of overburden from the geographic summit to the railbed itself.

Dave: I'm not really sure where the Boylston tunnel is, but reading about how money was spent for maintenance of snow sheds, if the tunnel was in a bad snowy area,maybe having a top was a "cheap" snow shed? Unless a tunnel is long enough to cause major smoke problems, what would be the advantage of daylighting a tunnel?

Boylston is in the center of Washington State west of the Columbia River and east of the Cascade Mountains, where most of the snow falls. The CMSP&P called it Johnson Creek tunnel #45. From Terraserver it looks like it would have been easy to daylight.
http://terraserver.microsoft.com/image.aspx?T=1&S=11&Z=10&X=1777&Y=12996&W Soo Line talked about daylighting tunnel #1 in Wisconsin during the early 1990's.

[Murphy Siding]

QUOTE: Originally posted by Mark_W._Hemphill

The big problems are lining maintenance and replacement and drainage. Many tunnels are drains for the local groundwater and thus are constantly soaking wet, which means that track alignment is a constant battle, and track structure (ties, rail, signal lines) fall apart rapidly.

And when something really bad happens, like a lining fire, it not only costs a fortune to repair it, the line is closed for days or weeks, which means the ENTIRE line on which it lies earns not a penny. A single good-sized tunnel problem can easily cost $100 million in repairs and lost earnings. Just adding up the tunnel problems I can think of in a few seconds on SP and former SP lines in the last 30 years -- Searls, Island Mountain (twice), Siskiyou Summit, Tunnel No. Whatever in the Cascades last year, these tunnels have cost more than $300 million (in 2005 dollars) in emergency repairs and lost earnings.

A lining fire![:0] Holy cow! I thought they were lined with concrete or clay. There must be some wood involved. I see what you mean by the water problem.

Thanks

[Anonymous]

Boylston tunnel cuts under the Saddle Mountains, completely desert country, little if any snow problems. It is my opinion that it would have been an excellent candidate for daylighting based on the east and west portal pictures I've seen.

[Murphy Siding]

QUOTE: Originally posted by futuremodal

Boylston tunnel cuts under the Saddle Mountains, completely desert country, little if any snow problems. It is my opinion that it would have been an excellent candidate for daylighting based on the east and west portal pictures I've seen.

Which brings up the question: Why didn't they daylight the cut originally? Wouldn't that have been easier than a tunnel to start with?

[Anonymous]

QUOTE: Originally posted by Murphy Siding

QUOTE: Originally posted by futuremodal

Boylston tunnel cuts under the Saddle Mountains, completely desert country, little if any snow problems. It is my opinion that it would have been an excellent candidate for daylighting based on the east and west portal pictures I've seen.

Which brings up the question: Why didn't they daylight the cut originally? Wouldn't that have been easier than a tunnel to start with?

I'm not sure when daylighting tunnels came into vogue, I would guess when construction equipment evolved into the massive machines they are today. Back in the pick and shovel days, it would have taken years to perform such a task.