| Posted by SES on February 27, 2022 | |
When our family lived along the Milwaukee Road Chehalis Sub, there were 2 occasions where Union Pacific ran on the branchline rails of the Milwaukee tracks between Tacoma and Chehalis due to temporary closure of the BN water level route. The first time was February into March 1980, right at the end of operations for the Milwaukee. In fact, Union Pacific had the honors of being the last to run trains until the end of March where the Milwaukee ran their last around the 15th. The 2nd time was about 1982, in the days when Weyerhauser's Chehalis Western ran log trains to Tacoma. I remember seeing the occasional UP train go by with GE's leading, but not that often. The big disappointment was by that time, UP was running bay window cabooses and their famous cupola cabooses had either been retired from the area or any remaining were relegated to local service so I didn't get to see any. (Not so sure on that in 1980 but definitely the case in 1982.) The interesting thing was the UP crews ran those trains through there awful fast even for excellent light rail trackconditions. I wasn't concerned so much after Weyerhauser made improvements on the track but at the last days of the Milwaukee, I don't know if I'd have run them like that on those twisted spaghetti rails. Trains ran by uninterrupted so I guess nothing flew off the track.
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