The 1998 deal left Union Pacific with permanent “overhead trackage rights” to the rails through the gorge, “ so as to preserve the integrity of the Tennessee Pass through route.” He shares use of the track with freight hauler Rock & Rail Railroad. In 1998, Mark Greksa’s Royal Gorge Express acquired 11.75 miles of Union Pacific track between Cañon City and Parkdale for his tourist trains. Pavement over the tracks in Leadville indicates how long it’s been - since 1997 -that trains rumbled on the Tennessee Pass Line. We told KCVN we intended to see those discussions through before exploring other options,” reads the unredacted document filed by Union Pacific that briefly appeared on the Surface Transportation Board’s website on March 9, according to. “Specifically, RGPC had expressed interest in purchasing from Union Pacific the portion of the Line from Parkdale to Gypsum, Colorado, and implementing both passenger and freight service. The federal government is conducting an Environmental Impact Statement studying the impacts of the roughly 85-mile Uinta Basin Railway project. If the Uinta Basin Railway is built and Rio Grande Pacific acquires Tennessee Pass, three to 10 trains hauling crude oil could travel south through Utah to Grand Junction to Minturn, over Tennessee Pass and through the Upper Arkansas River Valley en route to refineries on the Gulf Coast. Rio Grande Pacific is the planned operator of a $1.5 billion proposal for a new railroad connecting crude oil from Utah’s Uinta Basin with the national railway network. That filing, until it was redacted, included the name of the other party, which was caught by an intrepid reporter for the news wire who identified the suitor as Rio Grande Pacific Corp., which operates short lines in six states.
Union Pacific on March 9 urged the Surface Transportation Board to reject KCVN’s request for a forced sale, saying that it has been negotiating a sale of the Tennessee Pass Line with another party since last fall. “ We will be vigilant as to this issue,” the STB wrote. The Surface Transportation Board, in its approval of the merger, said if Union Pacific ever decides to sell the Tennessee Pass route, it should sell to an entity that will use it in the transportation system.
When Union Pacific and Southern Pacific merged in 1998, Union Pacific gave up on attempts to utilize the Tennessee Pass line and continued to rely solely on routing its coal-train traffic through the Moffat Tunnel, while promising to revive traffic on Tennessee Pass should Moffat Tunnel become clogged with trains. The Surface Transportation Board in 2017 approved Colorado Pacific’s call for a forced sale by V and S Railway, which acquired the troubled rail line from the Colorado Department of Transportation in 2005 and officially abandoned the line in 2011. The company’s application noted that KCVN owns 69,000 acres of Colorado wheat farmland worth about $50 million near the Towner Line and the company has “wealthy principals” who could afford additional costs related to the acquisition of the railway. The Surface Transportation Board approved KCVN’s application to force V and S Railway to sell southeast Colorado’s Towner Line in 2017.Ĭolorado Pacific Railroad in 2016 announced a $6 million plan to buy and rehabilitate the 122-mile Towner Line, which stretches through Otero, Kiowa, Crowley and Pueblo counties in southeast Colorado. KCVN has forced the sale of a rail line before. Rafters float the Arkansas River through Browns Canyon National Monument, where two companies are hoping to revive the Tennessee Pass Line railroad that has been dormant since 1997. KCVN’s attorney in that filing noted that when Crossroads wants to move Colorado grain west to flour mills in Utah or Southern California, it needs to ship it east 250 miles to reach a Union Pacific westbound rail line in Hutchinson, Kansas, and then it rolls 250 miles back into Colorado, “having traveled 500 miles without any net westward progress,” reads the filing. 14 application with the transportation board that it would need $278 million to rehabilitate more than 208 miles of track between the Royal Gorge and Dostero. Soloviev runs Crossroads Agriculture, a variety of agricultural businesses on KVCN’s vast acreage in Kansas and Colorado. Union Pacific last year declined Colorado Pacific’s offer of $10 million.Ĭolorado Pacific Railroad is owned by KCVN, which is owned by New York City high-rise developer Sheldon Solow and his son, Stefan Soloviev, who reclaimed the original spelling of his family’s name. It began in February, when Colorado Pacific Railroad filed an application with the Surface Transportation Board, asking it to force Union Pacific to sell the Tennessee Pass Line for $8.8 million. Trains could return to Colorado’s Tennessee Pass, rumble through Leadville under pair of proposals - The Colorado Sun Close
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