Railroad Forums 

  • MMA what if?

  • Discussion of present-day CM&Q operations, as well as discussion of predecessors Montreal, Maine & Atlantic Railway (MMA) and Bangor & Aroostook Railroad (BAR).
Discussion of present-day CM&Q operations, as well as discussion of predecessors Montreal, Maine & Atlantic Railway (MMA) and Bangor & Aroostook Railroad (BAR).

Moderator: MEC407

 #1498896  by backroadrails
 
So I know this is a far out what if scenario, but what if MMA didn't go bust after Lac-Megantic? Obviously CMQ, wouldn't have been created, and as a result all of the capitol improvements wouldn't have been made, and Maine Eastern would have most likely have received the lease for the Rockland Branch again. That being said, MMA instead of going belly up, would have been bailed out by it's parent company (Railworld) which would have most likely had to sell off other assets to keep the railroad. MMA would have also had to do some sort of asset management like what CMQ did, with the scrapping of long out of use BAR, CDAC, CP, and other Iron Road equipment left on property.
 #1498996  by Backshophoss
 
Some other major wreck would have happened,MMA was a wreck waiting to happen.
They did such slipshod maintenance on their power,track was in very poor shape,it would be shutdown by Transport Canada at any time.
All it would have taken was a "whistlebrower" to drop the dime on MMA
 #1499025  by NHV 669
 
backroadrails wrote:but what if MMA didn't go full Lac-Megantic?
We're talking the same outfit that repaired a mainline road unit engine block with Bondo.
 #1500781  by Zeke
 
They were poorly managed and under capitalized. Lac Megantic was the proverbial straw that broke the camels back taking down the whole enterprise.
 #1507398  by BandA
 
Every time a railroad goes through bankruptcy, assets get "rationalized" i.e. sold off. In this case the rolling stock got replaced & much of the Derby Shops got torn down or are going to be torn down? (and environmentally "remediated").

If MMA had not had the accident, more people would be alive. MMA might still be running one-man crews, but they would have had to step up the maintenance by now. Perhaps they would be overhauling MBTA locomotives in Maine.

If Lac Megantec had occurred but the Canadian division had been separately incorporated, the Canadian tracks might have been sold to another railroad or CP or shut down.
 #1512859  by Gilbert B Norman
 
Under a long standing treaty, any US road operating in Canada has a Canadian subsidiary through which they do business. That for the MMA was the MMA-Q. Another is the Napierville Jct, or D&H lines in Canada.

More visible though are the Canadian roads in the US. That of course means the Soo Line and the Grand Trunk, which now includes the IC.
 #1512911  by CN9634
 
I find the fantasy of “what if the MMA didn’t blow up a town” a strange and pointless discussion. That outfit had so many safety problems before Megantic, you should hear some of the stories from crews before hand. Then the screw job with the Aroostook lines, where they thought they could sell to that state and lease back for $1... make no mistake, MMA had a fine beginning but the middle and end of their story was fully of very dark tales, they are lucky on numerous occasions someone didn’t get badly hurt or killed. CMQ did things right and built the railroad into what it always should have been.
 #1512983  by bostontrainguy
 
So to take this "what if" conversation further . . . what if the CM&Q was taken over by [insert your suggested railroad]? It seems that the railroad is on the selling block and there are several possibilities. With the huge expansion of the Port of Saint John, who is going to buy it?
 #1513106  by bostontrainguy
 
It's kind of an orphan operation now and Fortress is not interested in railroads anymore.
Last edited by MEC407 on Mon Jul 08, 2019 3:16 pm, edited 1 time in total. Reason: unnecessary quoting
 #1513126  by roberttosh
 
I keep hearing about this expansion at the port of Saint John but am a bit skeptical that it is going to be the traffic bonanza for the CMQ that many are insinuating. I don’t see it competing for US traffic, which means it will be competing with Halifax, Montreal and the soon to be expanded port of Quebec City for domestic Canadian business. The combined, well entrenched port facilities at Halifax generate one intermodal train per day, so is there really THAT much business out there? Not to mention Saint John’s restrictive tide situation, the fact that it will be a 3 line rail haul to get anywhere and the aforementioned Quebec City situation. Could there be a cut of intermodal on the daily CMQ trains operating across Maine, sure, but again have a real hard time seeing this being anything close to a game changer.