< PREVIOUS ] [ 1996 Index ] [ Ed Quillen HOME ] [ SEARCH ] [ NEXT >
It's probably just a legend that Nero fiddled while
Rome burned,
but it's safe to surmise that if Roy Romer
had been emperor in A.D. 64, he would have appointed a
blue-ribbon commission to observe the fire and offer
suggestions as to disposition of the rubble.
At issue here is the proposed merger between the Union Pacific and Southern Pacific railroads. If consummated, the merger would mean the abandonment of hundreds of miles of Colorado trackage -- the former Missouri Pacific line along the Arkansas east from Pueblo to the Kansas border, and the old Denver & Rio Grande main line from Cañon City west up the Royal Gorge and over Tennessee Pass to its junction with the Moffat Tunnel line at Dotsero, where the Eagle River joins the Colorado.
In essence, the West would be left with two railroads -- the recently merged Burlington Northern Santa Fe system and the enlarged Union Pacific after it swallows the Southern Pacific (which includes the old D&RGW system).
Historically, Colorado has always fought against that kind of dominance. When the Union Pacific bypassed Denver in favor of Cheyenne in 1867, Denver's capitalists raised money and built the Denver Pacific so that their city would have a railroad connection.
A few years later, the Santa Fe railroad entered Colorado from the east, and threatened to take the commerce of southern Colorado toward Kansas City instead of north to Denver. Thus arose the Denver & Rio Grande, which ran south to Pueblo to keep Colorado connected, and went to a real shooting war with the Santa Fe in order to serve Leadville.
By the turn of the century, the D&RG was mostly operated, not for the benefit of Colorado, but for the benefit of the two lines that owned it -- the Missouri Pacific and the Western Pacific.
To insure that Colorado would have a railroad devoted to its interests, David Moffat launched the Denver, Northwestern & Pacific, which was opposed at every step by the Union Pacific. Moffat's route due west finally put Denver on a main line with the completion of the Moffat Tunnel in 1927 (paid for in large part by property taxes) and the Dotsero Cutoff in 1934 (financed with a loan from the federal government).
This public investment continues. There was a sales-tax
exemption so that the Southern Pacific (a/k/a the
Octopus,
and the successor to the Rio Grande) would put
its locomotive shops in Denver.
Phil Anschutz (owner of the Southern Pacific and Rio
Grande) is, in the words of state Sen. Linda Powers, the
richest man in Colorado,
and He got $23 million in
enterprise-zone tax breaks to create 1,500 jobs.
In short, we're not talking about some strictly private business here. Railroads are eager to grab every subsidy then can from our state government, but if the state wants something in return for this investment, well, there's some bare-knuckle politics.
Phil Anschutz will make out quite well if the UP-SP merger goes through. Until this year, mergers fell under the purview of the Interstate Commerce Commission, which has been abolished.
So the merger might have been reviewed by the U.S. Department of Justice on anti-trust grounds, and there were indications that it might be disapproved. To keep that from happening, our Republican Congress (and Anschutz is a major Republican contributor) voted to give railroad merger oversight to the new Surface Transportation Board, where approval is much more likely.
What happens if the merger goes through?
No more Tennessee Pass line. And how long will the Moffat Tunnel route last? Through traffic between Denver and Salt Lake City can go on the UP main line through Cheyenne and Ogden.
Local traffic will have to support the line, which means coal, primarily from the Craig area. Generating plants in Denver are under pressure to switch to natural gas. Other coal customers in Texas and the Midwest could be served by the Powder River strip mines in Wyoming.
The result would be an unprofitable Moffat Tunnel line, and another abandonment.
In the past, Colorado leaders fought hard to preserve an independent rail link across the Rockies. Sometimes they lost millions of dollars in the process, but they thought it was important.
This time around, Gov. Roy Romer talks about his good
friend Phil
and Sen. Ben Campbell says that he's not
going to interfere with the free enterprise system. If the
two companies want to merge, it's not my job to get
involved.
There's no shortage of potential operators such as the Montana Rail Link or Wisconsin Central which would like to take over the old D&RGW system and preserve rail competition in the West, while maintaining Colorado's hard-won connections.
But those proposals need some official support and some leadership. And instead, we have a study committee.
< PREVIOUS ] [ 1996 Index ] [ Ed Quillen HOME ] [ SEARCH ] [ NEXT >