Winona, MN shops

I posted a quirry in the structures and terminals forum, but thought I'd also ask the C&NW guys.

I lived in Winona, MN for three years (1995-1998) while attending classes at Winona State University, so I didn't really see much of the Northwestern, except for the changing of the guard from C&NW to Union Pacific. I used to walk along 3rd (or was it 2nd...) St. next to the C&NW yard. There isn't much for an engine terminal there... just a utilitarian fuling rack and an old quiosont (sp?) hut that must have been a shop building once upon a time...

However, east of the yard over by the city shops (where the city keeps its fleet of Crown Vics) are a bunch of rusted tracks sitting in the tall grass. There's also an old, bricked up industrial building there too, with a set of tracks coming out of one of the blocked up openings. A friend of mine in Winona seconded my suspicions that it might be part of the old C&NW shop complex and said the engine shops were located on that site. Two roundhouses and a backshop with a transfer table.

Other than Winona being the eastern end of the Huron line and the fact that Winona is a Mississippi River town (transfer to barge), I'm just currious to know why the Northwestern needed such an extensive shop complex in Winona? How much of it was built by the CGW before the C&NW merger? Just currious.

Well, thought I'd also pose this to the "experts." Would appreciate any info. you guys can share.

I posted this answer to the facilities area as well, along with additions per the question there.

The CNW shops were the ones near CK tower. At one time there was a very extensive operation. The building that still exist was part of the car shop complex. The main roundhouse was near it and as far as I know the concrete pad is still there.

One of the more interesting remnants of the C&NW at Winona is the bridge structure that remains in the Mississippi and in the area immediately southeast of the present road bridge. The swing bridge has been totally removed, leaving only a couple of rusting, disconnected steel spans. It gives you an idea of the route the CN&W took in crossing the river.
On the west side of the river the line took a hard turn to the north, and the station was located about where the hardware store is now, at the south end of the rail yard.
On the east side of the river, the rail line followed along Hwy 35 ('70's Hwy 35 widening covered the railbed) for a couple miles and then crossed through the marsh to the southeast - you can still the railbed and the bridge abutments sticking up out of the march from Hwy 35. There's also a still in use ex-Green Bay & Western track the runs through the marsh toward the southwest (where it T's into BNSF track). In their day, the two lines, C&NW and GB&W, intersected, at Marshland, WI, and the GB&W used CN&W track to get to Onalaska, where the GB&W had a line from Onalaska to its depot in La Crosse at 9th & Green Bay St.
If you follow the tracks in the streets of south Winona you will find the place where the GB&W used to have its own bridge across the Mississippi, that bridge burnt down in the '80's, and was not replaced.
Traveling east on Hwy 35 on the Wisconsin side, if you turn at the sign for the Wildlife Preserve, it will take you to solid ground C&NW railbed, which is now bike trail toward the south - in fact the 4 end to end trails will take you 106 miles to Reedsburg,WI.