I'm not going to disagree with Tom but hopefully add to this
discussion. The Milwaukee's mainline parallel's hwy 12 when it entered
into South Dakota. In Minnesota it ran somewhat South of #12, but
pretty much a straight shot to the Missouri River in the middle of South
Dakota. Both the NP and GN mains ran in a roughly 45 degree angle
toward North Dakota and it's major city Fargo (a great movie BTW). The
GN also had a line that split off and went Southwest to Sioux City, Iowa
that I assume is still functioning.
Whatever line Jim saw was probably BNSF, as they took over the MILW on
that mainline plus the original BN merger partners. The only competitor
in the area is now the CP with it's takeover of the SOO line and the
Dakota, Minnesota and Eastern (ex CNW) that ran from Minnesota to the
Black Hills in South Dakota. The CP, of course, runs from Ken Zieska'a
backyard to the Canadian border with North Dakota. When the MILW went
belly-up and embargoed everything from the Minnesota/South Dakota
border, the State of South Dakota instituted an addition 1% sales tax to
purchase the state's major routes. Regardless of your political
leanings regarding getting government involved in private business, it
seemed to work out for most everyone concerned as the line is now
profitable with unit grain and coal trains. Of course, our S scale
friend Mr. Dick Huff and his former Dakota Southern ran much of the
State's secondary mainline that once ran into the Black Hills also.
When I lived in Minneapolis, my better half and I, took a weekend trip
back home and we drove #12--at the time it was the slowest route you
could imagine. Little towns were established along the rail line for
each water stop. The road was still two lane and each town had a stop
light or two as you went right through each 'downtown'. We only took
that route once. I would assume things have gotten better. In high
school, our band instructor drove to Aberdeen, S. Dak to take the last
passenger train in the state to Minneapolis. It was a left over part of
the Olympian Hiawatha that left about mid-night. Since the train wasn't
too important except for the mail contract, it was terminated someplace
in route because of snow drifts. The conductor promptly obtain the
services of a local school bus to shuffle the small bunch of passengers
into Minneapolis. The prairies of that area can be unforgiving during
the long winter, but I sort of miss them!
Bob Werre
Jim,
The line paralleling US #12 was once the GN line. At one time Trains
27 and 28, The Fast Mail, operated over this line as did the Red
River. The NP line paralleled US #10 and ran through towns like Anoka,
Elk River, Little Falls, St. Cloud, Staples, and so on. Interesting,
to be sure, as to what has happened in the last 30 years.
Tom
________________________________________
From: [email protected] <mailto:S-Scale%40yahoogroups.com>
[[email protected] <mailto:S-Scale%40yahoogroups.com>] on behalf
of raisinone [[email protected] <mailto:raisinone%40wi.rr.com>]
Sent: Thursday, February 09, 2012 10:00 PM
To: [email protected] <mailto:S-Scale%40yahoogroups.com>
Subject: {S-Scale List} Real Trains and such
Ken:
The railline west from the Twin Cities through Delano and Litchfield,
MN; the one that parallels Hwy 12, was that originally GN or NP??
I drove out there there today and saw a dozen trains. Lead units were
CSX, NS, CN and BNSF; so the second question is who operates the line
today? I would have thought it was a BNSF property, but I saw more CSX
units than anything else on all those trains.
Jim Kindraka
--- In [email protected] <mailto:S-Scale%40yahoogroups.com>,
"mhrywest" <mhry19@...> wrote:
>
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