Why Is There a Railroad Over the Continental Divide in Colorado That Nobody Is Allowed to Tear Up?

Comments · 65

• OL

  @OldAlignment · 1 day ago (edited) · pinned

  First, the one everybody caught: Leadville is LED-vil, like the metal. I got it wrong in this one, and it will be right from here on.<br><br>Tennessee Pass is on US 24 between Leadville and Minturn. The railroad beside the highway still belongs to Union Pacific and is out of service, so the track is private property and not open to the public. If you want to ride this railroad legally, the Royal Gorge Route Railroad runs trains through the gorge from Canon City, over the 1879 hanging bridge.<br><br>Three things the records I found do not answer:<br>1. Whether anyone photographed the last train, the ore train that went over the top at twenty past six on August 23, 1997.<br>2. What really happened at the Pueblo roundhouse on June 11, 1879. Every account I found tells it differently.<br>3. The names of the helper crews working out of Minturn in the last years before the line closed.

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• RO

  @royreynolds108 · 1 day ago (edited)

  There was another pass the D&amp;RG had out of Pueblo going west. &nbsp;It was Marshall Pass. &nbsp;The route was Pueblo to Salida over Marshall Pass to Gunnison to Montrose through the Black Canyon of the Gunnerson to Delta to Grand Junction. &nbsp;This line was 3 feet gauge. &nbsp;Marshall Pass had 20- to 30-degree curves on 4% grades on both sides of the pass. &nbsp;The Tennessee Pass line was built to bypass the Marshall Pass route. &nbsp;In 1880, the Colorado Midland RR out of Colorado Springs started west and went up Ute Pass to Buena Vista over the Continental Divide at a pass called Hagerman Pass, then to Basalt, and then to Glenwood Springs. &nbsp;The CM was standard gauge and is what made the Rio Grande so quickly to change to standard gauge. &nbsp;The San Juan Extension was built in 1880 to Walsenburg over La Veta Pass to Alamosa and Antonito to Durango, and Silverton in 1881 &amp; 1882. &nbsp;The Antonito to Chama and Durango to Silverton sections are still in operation to this day.

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• ST

  @stevenjohnson7086 · 1 day ago

  I have been a freight trainman since 1998 out West. I never worked for The Grande or Uncle Pete, but the helper districts I have worked ( Cajon Subdivision and Mojave Subdivision) had manned helpers until Distributed Power took our jobs. The point I&apos;d like to make is that helpers often were added on the rear or sometimes cut-in the train for the down slope ride. This is to provide dynamic braking effort to reduce TPDBA (Tons Per Dynamic Brake Axle) on the head end units. <br><br>So helpers would shove uphill and throw out the anchor on the downslide. I&apos;d say the downhill braking help attributed to maybe 1/3 of the trips. Most of the trips were light engine back down the hill. Working the helpers is a great memory I am privileged to have.

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• KE

  @kevincurry4735 · 5 hours ago

  I have a special story about Tennessee Pass. &nbsp;My dad in 1995 read about the potential closing of the pass. &nbsp;So in May 1995 we drove from North Carolina to Colorado. &nbsp;Part of our trip was going to pass. &nbsp;So on May 6th and early May 7th we sat at the pass and watched trains struggle up the pass. &nbsp;It amazed me the number of engines needed just to get a train over the pass. &nbsp;One train needed 11 engines place in the front, middle, and end of the train. &nbsp;It was amazing scenic area a trip I will never forget.

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• RO

  @robertbichon5163 · 1 day ago

  I ran the stretch between Pueblo and Parkdale as a Locomotive Engineer for Rock and Rail Railroad, which is owned by Martin Marietta between 2018 and 2022. It&apos;s a challenge but I never felt unsafe. I would love someday to see more of the Tennessee Pass west of Parkdale.

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• TI

  @TimothyGuenther-o6v · 1 day ago

  My DAD worked for the D&amp;RGW for forty years he told me Tennessee pass was his favorite place to work

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• CH

  @chrismoffat9820 · 1 day ago

  I am the great great nephew of David Halliday Moffat. and I know that the main reason the line is still there is the US government. who needs it for strategic reasons. and for transportation of prisoners and refugees into the internment camps that are earmarked for the arkansas valley and for military bases. Maxwell park, Barrion park, and others will be tent cities for hundreds of thousands of people who will be interned or imprisoned or extradited there. as pows,treasonists , refugees, enemies of the state and military personnel,officers and their families, among many others. the arkansas valley is a strategic location &nbsp; in the middle of the state in the middle of the country. and all of its ingress and egress points can be easily controlled, guarded and monitor d. the military and the government are the real reason the Union Pacific won&apos;t allow it to be used for any other reason or dismantled and scrapped.

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• RO

  @ronaldmcelvain4700 · 15 hours ago

  As a Colorado Native with some familiarity of the areas described in this video, I found the images with only an exception or two to be the actual locations described leading me to conclude the dialog is presumably well researched and factual, unusual for a YouTube presentation in my experience.

• CU

  @CurtisSchukei · 9 minutes ago

  My understanding is that the government opposed the abandonment because there&apos;s only a limited number of rail crossings in the country.

• NC

  @ncascadehiker · 1 day ago

  Re-opening Tennessee Pass used to be a very hot topic on the ‘net, but people have given up waiting.

• ED

  @ednorton47 · 1 day ago (edited)

  I turned it off when I heard the narrator pronounce &quot;Leadville&quot;. &nbsp;What a poorly produced video. &nbsp;Untouched by human hands.

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• RY

  @Ryan_Rail · 1 day ago (edited)

  Today tho the Moffat Tunnle is poorly maintained, its too dark, too long, and too difficult too work in.<br>If the Moffat Tunnle where to have a collapse or a horrible accident inside of it, the Tennessee pass is a back up line and must be kept and a class 3 railroad standard incase they need to ever use the line again.

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