Had trouble posting on flimsies, so reverted here:

Posted July 10, 2002

DNR to hold railroad abandonment meeting for possible trail

Press-Gazette

The state Department of Natural Resources and the Outagamie County Parks Department will hold a public information meeting on Thursday to discuss the abandonment of the Canadian National Railroad corridor between Green Bay and New London, and its possible conversion to a state recreation trail.

The meeting will be held between 4 and 7:30 p.m. at the Black Creek Town Hall, N6051 Twelve Corners Road, Black Creek. DNR and county staff will be on hand to provide information and to answer questions.

The two agencies will make available maps of the area, state trail maps, trail photos and other information. The meeting will be conducted in an open house format, and no formal presentation is planned.

The DNR has proposed to the county that the DNR purchase the corridor and make it part of the State Recreation Trails System.


Port Huron Museum

tjgaffney@phmuseum.org

What is the status of the trackage between New London, Amherst Jct., and Stevens Point? All of this is former Green Bay & Western track--indeed, THE "Western" of the name.

Any thought of the nearby National Railway Museum doing anything with part of this route? They can get to it, albeit by traversing a few industrial-area tracks first.

Darn--I had a chance to chase either an Escanaba & Lake Superior train on its line or a WC train on this line when I was out there, and I chose the EMD on the E&LS.



lner4472@bcpl.net

What a shame. The GB&W was a proud little railroad that did all its own heavy maintenance and rebuilds and served a vital transportation function, until Wisconsin Central bought it, broke the unions and destroyed the property. Whatever one might say about their willingness to operate steam, they sure didn't do the GB&W any favors.

GB&W in better days..
ryarger@rypn.org

> You really can't blame the Wisconsin Central for the demise of the GB&W. The Green Bay Route's little niche in the state transportation network was that it took shipments off the car ferry in Kewaunee and brought them across the state so that they did not have to get tied up going through Chicago. When the car ferry stopped handling railroad cars out of Kewaunee about ten years ago, that spelled the end of the GB&W advantage, and thus the property went up for sale. Ed Burkardt and the Wisconsin Central tried for years to save the Green Bay shops for the Railroad Museum in Green Bay. The Musuem tried crunching the numbers many different ways but each time they knew that the restoration, maintenance and upkeep of that complex would drain their resources and so they had to turn it down for financial reasons

eselinsky@new.rr.com