Destruction of ex MEC Calais Branch now underway

[Mikejf]

If I remember the story correctly, the Passamaquoddy's claimed that they owned the rails when MEC went to abandon that branch in the late 70's. It was a few years to get things straightened out and the rails lifted.
Mike

[gokeefe]

Mike,

I heard the same thing and as I remember it my impression of the situation was that the claim was in fact legitimate as the railroad had some how managed to construct the Right of Way in a manner that was less than legal even by early 20th century standards (of course the State didn't always take standards into consideration in their treatment of the tribes back then).

[rrobserver1]

From the Ellsworth American: Seems someone else is not happy to see the rails go.

http://ellsworthmaine.com/site/index.ph ... rails.html

[sandyriverman]

The contractor for the rail removal is Vaughn Thibodeau and Sons of Bangor, ME. His is a ready mix concrete manufacturer and excavation, sand and gravel contractor with a reputation for slam-bang work, just what they wanted for this euthanasia project. Get in and out quick. i believe he is in charge of selling all the matl he removes. The rail is being sold to a used-rail dealer, don't have his name right at the moment but have seen it someplace. I looked at their site last fall and rail is sold priced accordingly to its condition/weight. I have it on pretty good authority that a lot of it has been contracted to some German railroad enterprise for relay at around 2.2 million. So its a pretty lucrative junking project for Mr Thibodeau.

Dale Henderson has now put the State in the position of "put up or shut up". Officials at MDOT use the lie as their stock and trade. I put zero faith in any thing they say. I am personally acquainted with Mr Pease as I have used his services. He is pretty capable guy. I have seen the language from some of those old deeds and it seems pretty clear that what was "owned" by the railroad was mostly the right to build and operate there with all that extinguished and reverting back to the landowner if it ceased to be used for railroad use. Pretty clear I think. And what the state bought was just what MEC owned which was mostly this.

Bu the state has the power of eminent domain which is used for road and utility building to extinguish claims and acquire title to property. That could and probably will be used if need be. Landowners don't usually do well against the power of the state. Very few attorneys want to push the state very hard since they routinely do business with state agencies on behalf of clients. No one wants to be "blackballed" for making too much of a fuss.

But bottom line, all sentiment aside, I agree with what Cowford has said that there is really no one along the line who wants to pay money to use it. The state is near broke so they have no money either.

One other point is that the fate of rail lines and roads are both in the hands of MDOT and the fact that these two entities are basically "competitors" makes it impossible for the same agency to do equal justice to both enterprises. Rail has been the loser for a long time and I don't think the end is in sight.

SRM

[pablo]

Mr. Pease will lose in a big way if the MDOT will is there. Even if the deed suggests that the land should revert back to the previous owner, the tangled web of rail-trails and reuse will guarantee the line stays intact, albeit as a trail.

Even if the rail-trail angle doesn;t work, there are a couple of creative ways to handle it to help facilitate this...and if those don't work, as mentioned, there's eminent domain.

It's fun to watch NIMBY's at work, though...especially when they lose.

Dave Becker

[Mikejf]

I hope this guy wins. The state has taken out an agreement to lift the rails and convert it to a multi-use trail. Most likeley all the state owns is the rail. The have the right to remove it, but if they don't own the land, they should not be able to change the use from private (railroad) use to public. Someone needs to stop the state before we (the people of Maine) own all the track in the state. The state is not a business and should not be getting into ownership of anything that could be business related. No income will ever be realized from such a project so we the lowly taxpayer are just out what ever money they spent for it.
Mike

[calaisbranch]

I've actually met Dale Henderson a couple times since our business has done residential work on a couple of his properties. His chunck of land that is in the mix with the rail trail exceeds 6500 acres! I wanna say, offhand, there are over 4 miles of ROW that go through his land. Not so sure he is doing the barricades against the STC for any other reason than laibility against idiots, but he does put a nice kink in the plans for now!

If this is a stupid question, forgive me, but isn't there an amount of years before property owners can reclaim land following an abandonment of a rail route? Does it differ from state to state?

[b&m 1566]

Did Guilford officially abandon the Calais Branch before selling it to the state of Maine? If so then, legally the land did revert back to the original land owners and the sale to the state should have never taken place OR was the line rail banked? I hope this guy is wrong; if he's right then the entire line from end to end will have already been diverted back to the original land owners which means you can kiss any future for the line good bye. The Downeast Scenic Railroad would be no more unless they get permission from each and every land owner.

Last I checked an official abandonment was when the land was given up by sale from the previous owner (Guilford) to the current owner (state of Maine).

Example: The Mt. Division was not abandoned in 1984; it was officially abandoned by the railroad via sale to NH & ME, which took place in 1992/1993. Previously to that it was just a rail line that was out of service but not officially abandoned as Guilford could have started using it at anytime. I'm sure the same thing happened to the Calais Branch; I'm pretty sure the state of Maine owns the ROW for the Calais Branch.

[Mikejf]

I would think that if Guilford had a right of way agreement with the landowner, it was just for the right for the use of the land. Also in that document could be the stipulation that if the rails were ever lifted, the right of way agreement would be cancelled. You just never know how things are written up.

[sandyriverman]

Did Guilford officially abandon the Calais Branch before selling it to the state of Maine?

Guilford abandoned the Calais branch in one fell swoop in the mid 80's. All rail and appurtenances were left in place as the state was in the process of negotiations to buy the line if the people of Maine would support it. A statewide referendum vote of the Maine people agreed to purchase the line to "preserve it for future rail use". I believe it would stand muster that at that time it still had rail use in its future as a possibility. I agree also that the state of Maine bought what Guilford actually owned at the time which in most places was a "right of way to construct and operate a railroad". That was not ownership of the land necessarily though MEC may have owned some land in some places. The line, particularly in Washington County, which was built later, is where the information comes from re the old deeds that I have had access to. I worked with several folks who are involved in the protest of all of this for a while til it became difficult for me to do it from New Hampshire. I have been told several times that there are a number of deeds that have this language.

Seems reasonable to me that use of it for rail purposes would be OK. Use for a "trail" is not the same. But it may all be a moot point in any case as the State of Maine has the power of eminent domain which means they can take property, paying the owners a fair value, for necessary projects in the public interest. The may be able to do so with this though I think it would be a cat fight. The landowners don't want the darn trail they want the railroad back.

Part of the reason we moved to NH is that I didn't want to stay around for the execution. It struck me as pretty interesting that all the people of Maine had a chance to vote to buy it but Gov Baldacci,along with his connected friends, issued a royal proclomation to "tear it up" and the people of Maine be damned. And they did. It is no coincidence that the destruction started in Machias. A family with many interests there were the strongest backers of the proposal for a trail. They hope to cash in with their stores and restaraunts I bet.

But there is some hope. The west end of the Calais branch, between Brewer and Ellsworth, was better built through better ground. The DESR has a lease on that whole section for some years. In Ellsworth is a fair amount of possible prospective rail business in the future depending what happens to our economic situation. It just might be that someone, or several someones in Ellsworth may decide that rail service would be a good thing again. That would be the best place that this possibly might happen. If that happened and any kind of semi regular operation took place it would not be that hard to expand further a bit at a time. This is just a pipe dream but Ellsworth is definitely the place to start this movement. Who knows what the Downeast guys may be able to pull off over time. Train service to Bangor would not be that difficult. The MDOT is very concerned about all the auto traffic to MDI and every single one of those cars flows through Ellsworth. They have been looking at ways to use mass transit to reach Acadia. Rail from Bangor to Ellsworth or maybe Franklin roads or into Lamoine would put Acadia well witihin reach of shuttle busses which the MDOT would love to see. This, in my opinion, is exactly why the MDOT leased the whole line from Brewer to Washington Jct in order to keep it under one entitiy just in case this kind of venture could be worked out some day. So who knows what the future will be. Maybe the seeds of that are right here in front of us.There is interest at the DESR to somewhat rehab the line to Brewer eventually so they can move equipment in and out. Possibilities from there might be real good. We can only hope.

SRM

[baldy]

Heard this morning on WNSX(FM) Winter Harbor, that Dale Henderson CAN keep the right of way blocked off untill the dispute is settled. Wonder if the judge sees some merit in his lawsuit?

[calaisbranch]

Judge ruled in Dale Henderson's favor last week.

http://ellsworthmaine.com/site/index.ph ... oject.html

See how long it holds up.....

J Bray

[gokeefe]

I was way Down East two weeks ago and went through Machias and Machiasport and saw the crews working on the line. They were down to flat earth and seemed to be moving right along. Although Henderson's action won't save the rail line those crews are out there right now and are making a lot of progress pretty quickly. I think the state is going to have a major outlay to bring the contractors back if he suceeds in delaying the proceedings for anything more than 3 months.

[calaisbranch]

If the State of Maine didn't acquire the Branch until 1987, the abandonment pre-dated the deal by two years. Ronald Karr's "Lost Railroads of New England" claims 1985 as the year of abandonment for the Calais Branch between Brewer and St. Croix Junction. If that's the case, the the State overstepped its boundaries with property owners who live along the ROW. Personally, I was shocked by how quick the court responded to this whole thing.

J Bray

[Mikejf]

Well, now that the judge has put a temporary stop to the destruction, who owns the rails. If the line can be proven to be abandoned before the acquisition by the state, do the rails become the property of the land owner?