#5 (11) Held up by flooding in Colorado

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Today's news from the Associated Press:

OMAHA, Neb. — Union Pacific railroad is repairing flood-damaged tracks in Colorado, and working to protect its main line crossing Nebraska as the floodwaters flow east into the Plains.


Union Pacific spokesman Mark Davis says flooding damaged about 20 miles of its line west over the mountains out of Denver and damaged another 19 miles of track between Denver and Cheyenne, Wyo.

Davis says the north-south track is expected to reopen Wednesday afternoon, but the line over the mountains will likely be closed for repairs until October 1.

UP is rerouting the 10 trains a day that normally use that line, and Amtrak is busing passengers over the mountains.

In Nebraska, UP raised seven miles of track near Ogallala 4 inches and piled rock along tracks between Julesburg, Colo., and Big Springs, Neb.
 
Saw a headline & info screen crawler on my local news today; that says Amtrak train passengers going west from DEN will be bussed to GJT due to track damage. For quite some. If UP fixes tracks between Greeley, CO & Cheyenne, WY ( and over to Utah)by Wednesday; then by Sunday when I travel to RNO on CZ; I will get to go this route instead. Amtrak used this route before; during the Coal Seam Fire about 4 years ago as soon as UP cleared it. I saw a post here, that showed part of the problem; it will be a huge challenge getting about 1.5 miles of track fixed just above tunnel 2 and before East Portal of Moffat. That section is was completely gone; track, roadbed, signaling & rock fall grid. For that matter the whole hillside is gone! Fixing track in flatlands is easy as long as roadbed is intact; track undermined in mountainous area where only a single track is there - much more complicated.
 
VentureForth said:
Could Amtrak make this the next Katrina/Sunset Ltd?
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Doubt it. The old Moffat line is the real cash cow of the former D&RG. Coal trains from the Craig area come down the line and then continue eastbound on the old Kansas Pacific across Kansas to KC and points beyond. UP has it's faults, but not fixing storm damage quickly isn't one of them. They'll literally move mountains to get the line reopened quickly.
 
People travel from all over the world to ride the train through the Colorado Rockies.

They didn't come from all over the world to ride a train through Tallahassee.

So it's not really an apples-to-apples comparison.
 
MikeM said:
VentureForth said:
Could Amtrak make this the next Katrina/Sunset Ltd?
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Doubt it. The old Moffat line is the real cash cow of the former D&RG. Coal trains from the Craig area come down the line and then continue eastbound on the old Kansas Pacific across Kansas to KC and points beyond. UP has it's faults, but not fixing storm damage quickly isn't one of them. They'll literally move mountains to get the line reopened quickly.
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The first snows of the season are only a couple of weeks out. When the snow flies in that area, it's measured in feet. UP may be good at repairs, but my guess is it will be next Spring before that line is open again.
 
I was in the CZ in Nov 2011 headed west and I did not see snow till we came out of Moffet tunnel. Though there were skiers nearby, I don't recall there being a lot of snow. Hopefully UP can get things repaired before any big snows.
 
Denver does have some occasional snowstorms in October. It's even worse up in the mountains. Snow might start up there in late September. A sudden mountain snowstorm in mid-October could not only cripple repair efforts, it could cause avanlanches that could wipe out even more track. Ensuing whiteout conditions could just stop everything until March.

See this:

http://www.thorntonweather.com/noaa/snow.php
 
I don't doubt there could be lots of snow. I was just saying that, if they're lucky, it could be a "dry"/mild fall for them, as it seemed to be in 2011. Mother Nature is fickle.
 
Realizing this has to be taken with several grains of salt, upon checking the long-term forecast for Fraser on Accuweather, which goes out 45 days, no snow is mentioned at all until the last week of October. It's been my experience that their predictions even that far out are fairly accurate when it comes to the general trend. Hopefully this is indeed accurate.
 
DaddyJim said:
So is the bus connection that they ran Monday between GJT and DEN not working as I see the #5 and #6 did not operate 09/17 or today 09/18
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I can confirm that Amtrak is still running #5 from Chicago. Here's #5(17) at Agency, Iowa (running approximately 37 minutes late):



I have no idea why these trains need to be under a service disruption when they are running normally Chicago to Denver and Emeryville to Grand Junction.
 
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Yes, I can also confirm that the western section is running, which is obvious anyway. I've been hearing that K5LA sounding long-long-short-long a bunch of times near RNO and I've also spotted it. I don't usually carry a camera around, so no picture. But it's running, that's for sure.
 
Thanks for the updates The wife and I leave this Sunday CLT to MDW on Southwest catch the EB to SEA for couple days and then SC to EMY for a couple of days and then catch the CZ 10/03 back to CHI for the flight home on Sunday 10/06 Would like to travel on the CZ route across the Mts and tunnels of Co as this is our first but not looking good for this trip, but we will sit back and enjoy.
 
jis said:
Thought y'all might find this article interesting, even though it is not directly about rail, it has bearing on the state of rail travel in Colorado at present.

http://www.coloradoan.com/viewart/20130914/NEWS01/309140020/Portrait-historic-deluge-Colorado
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Thanks for the link jis! A good article that puts this 'weather event' into perspective. In may ways - through timing and good dispatching - Amtrak got very lucky. Imagine if either 5 or 6 or both got stuck in the mountains. Even if they had been sitting at a 'safe' location, the passengers and crew would have had it a lot worse than say sitting at DEN for hours. Then there would be the problem of having a consist or two stuck for who knows how long, the bad press, etc. Those folks who 'threw up their hands' saying "Never again!" in DEN seem pretty foolish in hindsight.
 
Agent said:
DaddyJim said:
So is the bus connection that they ran Monday between GJT and DEN not working as I see the #5 and #6 did not operate 09/17 or today 09/18
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I have no idea why these trains need to be under a service disruption when they are running normally Chicago to Denver and Emeryville to Grand Junction.
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Um, because Amtrak can, and often does, suck when it comes to communicating with the public? :blink:
 
At the metropolitan lounge in Chicago. Taking the zephyr today. They're saying today's zephyr will be taking the Wyoming detour route. No more bus bridge.
 
Guinness835 said:
At the metropolitan lounge in Chicago. Taking the zephyr today. They're saying today's zephyr will be taking the Wyoming detour route. No more bus bridge.
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I wonder how they will take care of folks like us who have tickets from Grand Junction to Chicago early next week.
 
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