The Maine Central Railroad Mountain Division

NHV 669 wrote: ↑Wed Jun 09, 2021 12:07 pm The state has owned it for almost 25 years. If this was a viable idea, you'd think they'd already be sending cars to Berlin on the SLR to that landfill.

The law that stipulates that all of Massachusetts's waste gets sent out of state is far newer, and is the reason why so much trash is heading out via rail now. The economics weren't there in the past, but might be now, or not, who knows.

Yes, it makes us a ready target, but CSX is enjoying the benefits of hauling much of that trash.

FWIW, Dalton voted to extend their temporary zoning by five votes yesterday; Casella is going to have to strong-arm their way, if they want to get that landfill in. I just don't see this idea going anywhere. The rails in that stretch turn 100 next year as well.

Campaign for State Park buffer from landfills ends Fron the Union Leder
https://www.unionleader.com/news/enviro ... 84aa7.html

Bumping the thread with a season appropriate meet between YR1 and RY2 at Fryeburg, ME in December in 1980.
RY2 apparently left Rigby early this day, perhaps in advance of a holiday shutdown, and has pulled into the siding
which isn't long enough so has nosed into a stub track at the west end. The consist this day is 400-409-406-407
and an unrecorded U18B- half the U18 fleet! In a few minutes along comes YR1 with 565, MK5001 and 255. MK5001
was one of Morrison-Knudsen's Sulzer engine demonstrators which toured the MEC for a while.
Happy holidays everyone!

Thanks for sharing, Greg. Based on the light, it looks like RY-2 could have made it to the Notch before nightfall. Brings back good memories of the Mountain. Happy New Year!

Bumping the thread after almost a year with no posts, here are a couple of shots of
YR2 at Notchland during the reconstruction of Route 302 with the new overpass. The
engine consist includes 262-263-801-802-403 and separated by one boxcar are ex L&N
393 and 439 on their way to Waterville for rebuilding. Happy holidays everyone.

There is a good article in the recent Trains magazine that talks about Mellon's Guilford Transportation's purchase of the Maine Central and Boston and Maine 40 years ago. There is one photo of two beautifully clean Guilford GP7s (470 and 573) leading a press special about to head up through the notch with the caption, " . . . heading up the scenic Mountain Division, soon to be abandoned in favor of a longer Maine Central/Boston & Maine/Delaware and Hudson routing". Just have to wonder how things might have ended up if the chips had fallen a little bit differently.

The story we were given back in 1980 was U.S.Filter owned a lot of coal in southwest Pennsylvania and planned to ship it by rail to Portland to be loaded on ships for export. That didn't make a lot of sense back then and still doesn't today. It is more expensive to ship by rail than by water so the transfer to water is usually at the nearest port possible. Baltimore was already in that business, having the equipment and facilities as well as being a lot closer. Then add in the cost to upgrade the railroad to handle that traffic and build new facilities in Portland. The purchase of Maine Central and then quickly flipping it to GTI six months later always seemed a little too contrived to me-

these deals just don't happen that fast. U.S.Filter was itself sold to Ashland Oil shortly after purchasing MEC and stated the sale to GTI was because Ashland was going to take the company in a different direction and didn't need or want MEC. How convenient Timothy Mellon just happened to be sitting there with an empty lap for this to fall into. E. Spencer Miller had long resisted overtures from F.C.Dumaine and his Amoskeag Corp. and probably felt selling to U.S.Filter was a way to keep it out of Dumaine's hands and was later said to regret the sale. The Mellon family banking interests quite possibly could have bee involved in the financial transactions between the three companies so who knows what kind of wheeling and dealing went on behind closed doors. Now it's just moot conjecture 40+ years later.

It should also be noted that Norfork Southern was trying to buy Conrail and after GTI purchased
MEC, B&M and D&H, NS came up with a plan to spin off lines of the former EL and NKP to GTI
to provide some semblance of competition in the northeast. This plan fell apart when CSX
contested the purchase resulting in NS and CSX agreeing to split Conrail between them. With
this, GTI's grand expansion plans to Chicago and St. Louis evaporated.

When GTI moved the CP interchange point, did they just dust off the cobwebs to the original MEC plans? IIRC, the MEC tried to eliminate the Mountain Division as far back as the 1920's. At the time the MEC was still leasing the line from the P&O, is it possible P&O shareholders blocked the move or was it other factors?

S1f3432 wrote: ↑Mon Dec 26, 2022 6:11 pm It should also be noted that Norfork Southern was trying to buy Conrail and after GTI purchased
MEC, B&M and D&H, NS came up with a plan to spin off lines of the former EL and NKP to GTI
to provide some semblance of competition in the northeast. This plan fell apart when CSX
contested the purchase resulting in NS and CSX agreeing to split Conrail between them. With
this, GTI's grand expansion plans to Chicago and St. Louis evaporated.

I still have a copy of the original plan, "Acquisition of Rail Properties in Connection with Purchase by Norfolk Southern Corporation of Common Stock of Consolidated Rail Corporation" dated June 30, 1985.

Map included:

Responding to the post by "Who", I remember reading an article ( I think it was in "CN Lines", the publication of the CN SIG ) that as far back as the 1930's MEC and CN had discussions about MEC detouring over GT between Danville or Yarmouth Jct. and Groveton and GT going into Portland over MEC but they could never come to terms. I suspect money was only part of the issue; the other being neither railroad wanting to be dependent on the other. There was precedent for this as trains of one railroad had detoured over the other occasionally on account of derailments and CN's Maine Coast Special in the 1930's ran to Portland Union Station and then to Old Orchard Beach over MEC/B&M from Yarmouth Jct.

I’ve been following (and contributing to) the current proceedings following LD 404 which involves ripping up the Mountain Division from Standish to Fryeburg for a rail trail.

Yesterday the transportation committee held a vote on it and a bill to rip up the St. Lawrence and Atlantic line from Portland to Lewiston. The St. L&A bill was tossed but the Mt. Division vote was “split” and will have to be voted on by legislators in order to determine whether or not it will pass.

Interesting to note is the testimony offered by David Swirk of the Conway Scenic Railroad, who said if they were given a 99-year lease on the Maine portion they would work with MaineDOT to develop an operational plan for running the line to Portland. Who knows how the legislature will act but it’s promising that a legitimate (not Golden Eagle) company is offering to take a genuine look at the Mountain Division.

All information can be found on the Maine government transportation committee website.

Well that's interesting. Boston to the North Conway area should have year round passenger potential.

Eh, I dunno about full-on passenger; they mainly stated interest in tourist and freight. Perhaps passenger at a later date, who knows?

The full testimony presentation includes a mention of Portland’s cruise port, made me wonder if they’re thinking of something similar to what White Pass and Yukon in Alaska does with the cruises that land in Skagway. How exactly they expect to get anywhere close to it without relaying tracks down Commercial street is a mystery.

All this is in the proposal/interest stage. The hurdle of turning down 404 needs to be jumped before something like this can be considered in full. Still, it’s an exciting prospect.