Forgotten Lands, Places and Transit

The Lucin Cutoff is today’s Union Pacific mainline across the Great Salt Lake between Lucin and Ogden, UT, and remains an incredible feat of engineering even to this day.  Construction of the Lucin Cutoff The Cutoff was built by the Southern Pacific in 1904, and at 102 miles in length, it shaved 44 miles off of the Original Transcontinental Railroad route, and also featured an easier grade, only having to traverse over water as opposed to varying land.  Laying track on the wooden trestle of the original grade. The original route was only used for local farming customers and passengers, while mainline traffic used the Cutoff.  What had originated thanks to a war was also abandoned as a result of war. The Transcontinental Railroad's original alignment around the Great Salt Lake would be abandoned in its entirety in 1942, with the iron rails reclaimed to aid in the effort of World War II, with the exception of the area around Promontory Point, which is now part of Golden ...

The narrow-gauge Martha’s Vineyard Railroad ran on Martha’s Vineyard Island, connecting Oak Bluffs with Edgartown, MA. ( Right of way ).  From Oak Bluffs, steamships of the  Old Colony Railroad  would transport passengers to  Woods Hole  on the mainland, whose line today has since been abandoned as well. The train Active leaving Oak Bluffs wharf for Edgartown. From a stereoview. Scan courtesy oldtimeislands.org via Wikipedia Commons . From  Tracing the Route of the Martha's Vineyard Railroad It took just eight weeks to build this line in 1874, after a decline in the whaling industry left Massachusetts industrialists scrambling to develop a new source of revenue. The natural beauty of the island made tourism a viable option, and thus the line transported island tourists to and from ferry operations to connect to mainland Massachusetts.  Say what you will, but you have to love the aesthetics in this picture! ( Wikipedia Commons ) While an eight week tim...

The Cape Girardeau & Chester Railroad connected Cape Girardeau with Jackson, MO and the Missouri Pacific Railroad . It eventually became the  Cape Girardeau Northern Railroad  in 1905, after the earlier company floundered, partially due to its poor construction. In 1913, the St. Louis & San Francisco Railway planned to acquire a majority of its stock, but operate it as a separate company. ( Right of way map ) The CGN had many of the same faults of numerous other short lines of the day, mainly poor construction and questionable necessity, as often the mere existence of a new railroad did not generate enough economic development to justify its existence. Further, they dealt with increasing competition from improved roads and automobiles during this time, which would further burden operations. The CGN travels through the floodwaters of 1909 around the Cape Girardeau area. (Southeast Missourian) "A July 1909 river flood inundated downtown Cape Girardeau. Here, a Chicago ...

The Cliff Hanger at Ghost Town in the Sky is a Hopkins designed looping coaster, first built in 1988 as Red Devil. At a height of the ride from top to bottom of only 90 feet and a layout of just over 2000' in length, its stats were not the reason this ride is considered one of the most interesting standing-but-not-operating rides out there, but rather its location. Ghost Town Village, when it was planned to open in April 201 9. (Beverly-Hanks & Associates photo) Located at the side of a mountainside made this ride was one of the most unique coasters in the United States, along with the rest of the park. The park was located in Maggie Valley, NC, and was only accessible via a chairlift, which climbs 1,250 feet in elevation to the entrance. The ride was originally painted red, but that paint has faded over time, and evidently was repainted off-white during one of the long periods of downtime. Image: Carl D Ragan, UltimateCoaster.com via RCDB In addition to being in the mountain...

The Nevada Central Railway was a narrow gauge railway that connected the silver mines at Austin, NV with the Transcontinental Railroad at Battle Mountain, NV, a distance of 93 miles. Nevada Central Railroad, Engine #5, ca. 1890. University of Nevada-Reno Collection. Built in 1880, the line was a little late to the silver boom, which ended in the late 1880’s. The line had been approved by the Nevada Legislature in 1874, but construction wouldn't even begin until late in 1878.  Unfortunately for the railroad, it only gained profitability if the mines at Austin were producing full loads, which was rarely the case. In 1881, it was sold to the Union Pacific Railroad , with whom it interchanged with at Battle Mountain, but UP ran it as an independent company.  The idea was an ill-conceived scheme on behalf of the UP to build a line through Central Nevada during the silver boom, but as the boom ended soon after acquisition, UP instead allowed the road to go into bankruptcy in 1884....

The Kankakee & Urbana Traction Company Railroad was an interurban electric line that was planned to run between its namesake cities, and further was planned to extend all the way to Chicago, and other points beyond the two cities. Most ambitious were plans to use the Illinois Traction Company to connect all the way to St. Louis. It never made it north of Paxton. Had it connected to Kankakee, it could have used other interurbans to connect all the way to Chicago, namely the Chicago & Southern, later known as the  Chicago & Interurban Traction Line to Harvey, and then the Illinois Central Electric Line north into downtown. Image via George Friedman's wonderfully detailed blog on the line. After a couple years of planning, the line came into fruition in 1906. Like many interurban lines, financial pressures would force the line to close in 1926. Although right of way was graded north of Paxton, and even some track was laid, it could never make it north.  Foreman Fr...

Much like the town of  Anthony, KS , North Judson, IN is another town that once was a junction between multiple railroads, today all of which are long gone, save for one huge difference, which is the subject of today's blog. Source: 1959 USGS North Judson Map At this intersection today, the railroad history of North Judson is preserved with the Hoosier Valley Railroad Museum , which does a great job of taking the complicated rail network of yesteryear, and paying homage to the bygone days of each line. Today's blog will show images from what the lines look like today, in and around North Judson, as well as shots from my visit to the museum. North Judson is one of the two places in northwest Indiana we've discussed where more than three railroads intersected, with the other being the huge railroad intersection in Griffith, IN . North Judson, IN Today: North Judson on our  Abandoned Railroad Rights-of-Way Map The ties from the NYC Kankakee Belt Route are...