Columbia Cascade and Western - 8
9: In addition to the main line and siding at Tallman,
tracks serve an LPG farm, a oil and coal dealer; Birdseye,
National Fruit, and Simplot packing houses; a farmers
co-op, and a furniture frame maker.
10: New power like the EMD tunnel motors carries a
bright red and black paint scheme instead of the ‘60s-
era gray and blue on older locomotives. The CC&W lay-
out is set in 1979.
9
10
have staging over here west and then we ran through Tallman
here behind us, so the idea was, why don’t we do it in stages?
And why don’t we have the other end be mobile staging?
“So one of the members came up with the idea, why don’t we
build an aircraft carrier with like three tracks on it that were
the length of our longest train, and we could move it as we
progressed.
“That’s what we did. The first phase was over in Lyons as a
three track staging, so we ran trains from staging in Albany to
staging in Lyons. Then, we moved it on an angle because we
wanted to start phase 2.
“Once we got phase 2 started, we pulled it out, and brought it
in here. Now it’s in its last location, the USS Granite Mountain.
Once we get phase 3 in, we will be taking it out altogether and
it will be scrapped.”
MRH:
“What has been the biggest challenge so far, aside from
30-odd truckloads of dirt?”
Rick:
“I don’t know what would be the biggest challenge. It’s
been really smooth. We’ve had some bonuses. When we were
mapping out the valances we found out that both rooms were
actually a foot wider each way. Thankfully, it was a foot wider
and not a foot narrower. The only other, in the back room there
are nine posts. We could not take them out, because they’re
supporting three beams.
“We miscalculated where the coordinates of some of those
posts were. So it turned out we have track that, instead of
going behind the post, goes in front of the posts.
“The other challenge designing the layout was trying to get
it to meander around the posts. You’re going to have your
MRH-Feb 2013
