Railfanning St. Joseph Mo.

I'm planning to be in the St Joe area in early October, but have not been able to find anything relating to railfanning around there, despite the presence of a major BNSF line directly thru town on the river banks and another UP line across the river in Kansas, does anyone know of any websites that cover this area?

No websitess, but I've been in that area a couple times. The BNSF tracks are very busy, as are the UP ones in Atchison. A good place, located about an hour northwest of St.Joseph, is Falls City, Nebraska, where that UP and BNSF line cross right below the US73 highway bridge. You can park at the old Missouri Pacific depot to observe the action. The UP line, while being the same line, isn't as busy as it is through Atchison, as empty coal trains are routed through Atchison to Hiawatha, and then over to Marysville, and so don't make it to Falls City at all. In fact, I am unclear how many trains UP does put over the line north of Atchison. I would guess about a dozen or so with 50-60 on the BNSF.

I stayed there a night last year. It's a depressing shadow of what it used to be. The meatpacking industry no longer needs the RR's like they used to, obviously. Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but I think the UP just recently filed for abandonment of their track in Kansas that went to St. Joe.

Is that the "Saint Joseph Industial Lead"? I found the application on the STB website. Its got to be the longest track I've ever heard of being called an industrial lead ever!
http://stb.dot.gov/filings/all.nsf/ae24 ... 211983.pdf

No real surprise with the abandonment. As was stated in the report, UP acceses St. Joe from Atchison, not Hiawatha.