In central Illinois a cross country power line is being built. They seem to have all kinds of domain were to run this utility. The lawyers told my parents that they should take the utilities offer for the land usage of were the towers are being built. Big exception the power lines are crossing the abandoned Wabash trackage that runs across 160 acres of my parents farmland. The ownership of the trackage has to be determined and compensation for crossing the right of way. There is no trackage south to Sullivan or north to Lovington. This is isolated trackage my grandfather bought that is 1/2 mile long. Ownership is to be determined on November 12, 2014 in court in Springfield , Illinois. One of the proposals is to remove the trackage that has been abandoned since the 1960's so the utilities don't have to pay the owners of the current trackage for crossing it with high wires. I thought this was a bit confusing as does my 80 yr old father. hocarsandtrains. James

is construction already started? Seems they are jumping the gun if so. They have to thoroughly scout it out. You may have to check some landownowner information and records before continuing on, yay or nay.

We had an issue here for the power company installed radio transmitters in the power meter, the truck only has to drive by than visibly read the meter, but the radio was interefering with AM broadcasts, I wrote FCC and got leads where to legally go. The point explaning this is to persue the legalities and get it right.

Sorry I did not see this post before today (after your court date, James). I found your post interesting, that a bit of trackage remained of this once-viable part of the Wabash 8th District. Since I am not a lawyer I can't advise how to proceed or what should be done, but I can provide a little history. In an article written by Brad Friese and published in the WRHS Banner (No. 63-64-65; 2007), he indicates that the line running south from Bement to Sullivan had been embargoed since Feb. 12, 1974 by the Norfolk & Western. They applied to the ICC for abandonment Aug. 26, 1976; the railroad claimed that it would have cost them 1.5 million dollars to re-establish service from Bement down to Sullivan. The ICC apparently approved N&W's application and by 1977, the line was torn up.

James Holzmeier
Wabash Railroad Historical Soc.

I talked to my father tonight and he said the power lines will be routed south of the Hall-Johnson road instead of north of it were the track remenates are. The right away still belongs to the N&S, who were also at the hearing. Thanks for the Wabash historic information my parents remember trains running into the mid sixties when the Cushman elevator was closed and torn down. In Sullivan part of the Wabash trackage is still accessed from the Union Pacific former Missouri Pacific , I believe to a fertilizer business. That maybe abandoned now I can't tell from google. Great uncle Herman Capshaw worked for the Wabash in the fifties and sixties in the Decatur shops. James

interesting NS still owns the ROW, when the Notre Dame Line was abandoned the ROW was still retained as ownership, maybe a good idea if it gets re-activated, so maybe NS has some smarts about things. Once a rail line totally smothered, its difficult to return without millions of dollars.

Hi,

A sort of similar item has been going on about ROW and its uses since about 1988. Several railroads started laying fiber optic along their ROW and ran afoul of some in Ohio and Indiana who said the property was deeded to the railroads "for railroad use only". It also came out that many sections of ROW were given to railroads with the understanding that the property would be returned to the owners if the railroad was removed.

It has been a class action suit and is slowly being settled. The railroads are paying for the rights to use RR ROW for non-RR use to the adjacent property owners (instead of trying to follow the tedious ownership from the middle 1880s).

I am waiting for my check right now. The rate is $0.94 cents per foot of frontage.

Crazy but interesting.

Doug vV