CSX Track Upgrades & Infrastructure of Pan Am

Tie job should start up this week on the Keag line... reopen the interchange around Nov 1st

Awesome!

a good tie gang can install 800 to 1,000 ties per day, it is about 50 miles Bangor tp mattakeag ,if they put in 800 ties per day per mile they should be able to finish in 50 days.Iwas talking to a welded rail gang on the framingham secondary in MA and he said they work 2 weeks on and 2 weeks off working 11 to 12 hour days.When they are off, another gang will come in and use the same equipment for 2 weeks so they get 100% production out of the same equipment.That Far East in maine in the fall,they may not get 12 hours of daylight this time of year.Also the road crossing ties must be very bad, has anyone seen any work at the crossings.ANY UPDATES. THANKS

That is similar to what NS did when they rebuilt PAS in 2009 - one crew came in and spend 10 days working, then had 10 days off while another came in.

fromway wrote: ↑Mon Oct 03, 2022 11:16 am With all the improvements coming to the Keag line, will CSX run all the way to SJ or will they interchange with NBSR? The Keag will become a busy place with CP and CSX competing to get into SJ. Mr. Irving is loving it, I am sure.

CSX and CP have haulage rights to Saint John, but thats about it. With Irving running two train pairs a day, it sounds like the interchange will be done in whats left of the yard at Mattawamkeag, which will be more than enough capacity for the current traffic levels.

I’d be shocked to learn that CP hasn’t yet made an offer to buy the line from Brownsville Jct to St John. Seems almost inevitable that CP ends up owning it again someday.

CSX might have *some* interest in owning that line, but I’m assuming that most of the IM traffic at St John goes across Canada rather than down the East Coast.

Now, will Irving ever sell? That’s the (hundred) million dollar question!

From what I know Irving was made an offer and told CP they will not sell at any price. The Irvings pretty much own New Brunswick and the railroad is one of the prime drivers.

CPR never did own the New Brunswick portion of the line, it was a long-term leased property
with the Irving's having acquired ownership somewhere along the way. When CPR attempted to
abandon the property the Irvings stepped in to reclaim their property. Given that sequence of
events it's understandable why they wouldn't be interested in selling to CPR- Irving is in it for
the long term; CP being an opportunist for the time being. The portion of the former European
And North American R.R. between Mattawamkeag and Vanceboro was owned by Maine Central
Railroad with CPR operating over it with trackage rights. Maine Central had some large debt
maturing and used the money generated by the sale of the line to CPR to retire that debt. The
line from Megantic to Mattawamkeag was built by CPR in the 1880's.

CP should have never sold the old Canadian Atlantic Railway back in the mid 1990s. However, they had just worked the purchase of the Delaware & Hudson earlier in 1991 and believed the eastern Quebec, Maine and New Brunswick trackage was no longer a revenue generator to the overall CP system. One wonders that had CP retained all of the CAR, would CSX be interested in the acquisition of the Pan Am if the Port of Saint John was largely captive to CP's network to the west?

When the large transoceanic shipping companies decided back in the 1980's to abandon
service to St. John and sail to Halifax and/or New York it resulted in traffic falling to a trickle
for CP, particularly in the winter when the line served as a bypass to the frozen St. Lawrence
River and the Port of Montreal. Flood damage and partial abandonment of the branch north
out of McAdam to Edmundston resulted in less traffic and interchange off BAR was declining
as well. Doubtful anyone with a crystal ball envisioned a return of large container ships to
St. John and CP chose to rationalize their plant just as all the other class ones were doing.

mrj1981 wrote: ↑Sun Oct 09, 2022 10:06 am I’d be shocked to learn that CP hasn’t yet made an offer to buy the line from Brownsville Jct to St John. Seems almost inevitable that CP ends up owning it again someday.

CSX might have *some* interest in owning that line, but I’m assuming that most of the IM traffic at St John goes across Canada rather than down the East Coast.

Now, will Irving ever sell? That’s the (hundred) million dollar question!

Thats one thing that will never happen. Once JD Irving buys something, it doesn't get spun off by the empire. The railroad is too important for them to sell. Irving has no intentions of selling, since they can move their own freight for essentially just what it costs for labor. Thats one thing no other railroad could do. Plus the majority of cars that the company owns are restricted due to age, which if you recall CP had a similar situation with the CMQ log racks, which were subsequently chopped up so they wouldn't have to deal with the log business anymore. Irving originally eyed the railroad as a pipeline for raw goods and a way to ship out finished products, but they are fully aware of what position they are in currently and how much of a cash cow the railroad is going to be. So its safe to say its going nowhere.

I'm told CSX is seriously interested in the Low Road. Sounds as though it has less obstructions relative to double stack clearing. I guess when you have to rebuild everything from the ground up anyways you can pick the most long term advantageous line.

A few negatives to that:

-they don't own between Brunswick and Augusta
-it would bypass both Leeds and Danville junction. They would have to maintain both routes. May not be cost effective.
-Currently no double iron to pass Amtrak between Royal and Brunswick.

No show stoppers, just may make it a stretch.

Who owns the Brunswick- Augusts section? I recall the state owns it. Does ME DOT prefer rails to trails or DS capable mainline?

As for maintaining both routes, are there any customers between Leeds jct and Oakland? If not, the middle-upper section of the back road could be effectively replaced by the lower road.

I read somewhere that mec preferred to run eastbound trains on the lower road bc of the grade.