Hey guys-- I have an intereasting question: What is the rarest amtrak train station not bus stop, I mean in the middl eof nowhere and like in the country, I would assume this would be on a route in the East coast, but I find it an intereasting question living in california where every town had thousands of people.
Probably one of the Empire Builder stops in Montana or North Dakota
Posted by Mike Smith (Member # 447) on :
Williams, AZ
It's a lighted, paved area north of town. You have to take a dirt road to get to town.
It might not qualify as a station, due to the lack of a station, but it is a scheduled stop.
[This message has been edited by mikesmith (edited 02-29-2004).]
Posted by TwinStarRocket (Member # 2142) on :
Actually the Montana and North Dakota stops are fairly large towns with lots of businesses and the depots are right downtown. I would vote for Lordsburg, NM and its covered bench. Deming and Benson AZ are close seconds.
Posted by RRRICH (Member # 1418) on :
Essex, Montana, on the Empire Builder route -- the "station" is a cleared area in the woods next to the Izaak Walton Inn, designed to serve people who are staying at the IW. A van will take you from the hotel to the designated patch of dirt where the train stops!
Posted by coachclass (Member # 2382) on :
On a recent trip on the Southwest Chief we stopped at the Williams, AZ stop as described above. No one got off the train so the van driver walked over to the light post and flipped a switch, the light turned off, and the station completely disappeared into the darkness!
Posted by canoe86 (Member # 3099) on :
This is not an US amtrak stop, but is funny so I will add it. In northern Manitoba, from 'The Pas' to Puckatawagan. Engine, cold box car, regular box car, passenger car (think butch cassidy and sun dance kid movie type car), and a caboose. About a five hour trip of which I have many, many stories. But on the way back to The Pas, through the wild Canadien wildrness, the train started slowing down and stopped. We were sitting in the caboose with engineers/workers and I asked why were we stopping. The guy said, there was a stop here. WE were miles from anyplace, no roads, no cars, no buildings. Just stopped in the middle of the forest. Sure enough, 5 people climb off the train and take a little foot path into the woods. Train started again and we continued on. It was very funny especailly considering I live in a rural area...just not that rural!!
Posted by Gilbert B Norman (Member # 1541) on :
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Posted by espeefoamer (Member # 2815) on :
In Mexico,I rode the 2nd class train,all coach)from Bengimin Hill to Mexicali.There were two stops.El Doctor,and K121.In the daytime nothing is visible except a signpost in the sand,and and nothing but desert as far as you could see in any direction.When the train stopped at these points at night,a large group of people was gathered at each "station."
I'm pretty sure Coachclass is refering to Williams Junction. AMTRAK doesn't go through Williams anymore. The van from the Fray Marcos Hotel in Williams drops passengers off at Williams Jct. and picks them up as well.
The "New Fray Marcos" is part of a complex that includes the old hotel, the old station, a large restaurant and the Grand Canyon Railway. Trips to and from the Canyon Rim are lots of fun and include a variety of equipment. We rode up in a vintage wooden coach with soft seats and windows that opened. Upgraded for the trip back to a '50's vintage coach with A/C, a nice selection of cheese, fruit etc. and champagne. AAA has some very good packages.
Posted by George Harris (Member # 2077) on :
Amtrak never did go through Williams. In about 1960 the Santa Fe built about 40 miles of new main line between "Williams Junction" and "Crookton" to bypass the steep and crroked segment of line through Ash Fork. The old line had grades of up to 1.8% and multiple curves with slow speed restrictions. The maximum grade on the new line is 1.0% and there are no curves with speed restrictions below the line speed of 90 mph. Williams Junction is about 3 miles east of Williams. Only the Pheonix line and Grand Canyon line trains continued to go through Williams. A new passenger stop for the main line trains was created at Williams Junction. The Grand Canyon line goes under the new line in a large box culvert type structure about 1.5 miles north of the wye track connection to the old main line which is about 1/2 miles east of Williams station. Go to topozone.com and enter the location as Williams AZ. If you do not see the connection at first, choose a larger scale and click on the "Update Map" button. I40 generally follows the line of the original railway. The new line is several miles to the north.
Posted by RRRICH (Member # 1418) on :
Since I have mapped all the AMTRAK lines on USGS topographic maps, I can verify that George is absolutely right!!
Posted by Southwest Chief (Member # 1227) on :
There used to be a really neat modern Santa Fe station at Williams Junction. It was built during the Crookton relocation and might have been one of the newest stations on the Santa Fe mainine. It looked very 50's 60's and wasn't like any other station on the line. Too bad it was torn down. I bet the Grand Canyon Railway wished it was still there.
The only photo I've seen of it was in a book on the Santa Fe in Arizona.
Posted by sbalax (Member # 2801) on :
Was Williams a passenger stop on the AT&SF before AMTRAK? I seem to recall stopping there on the El Capitán headed to Chicago in 1953 as a train-crazy 12 year old.
Posted by CoastStarlight99 (Member # 2734) on :
What about Essex.What is in Williams JUnction?
And YES Williams was and still is a scheduled stop....I checked the timestable! AND are there any other???/
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Posted by George Harris (Member # 2077) on :
According to the USGS map as downloaded from topozone, Williams Junction consists of the double track Santa Fe main line, two extra track on the north side about 3000 feet total, and the Pheonix Line / old main line connection about 1/2 mile to the west. Roads: there is a dirt road on the south side of the railroad, a grade crossing about 1/4 mile east, a dirt road on the north side going off to the east, a short dirt road to the west going to a sewage disposal pond, and a road, maybe paved, going up to AZ-64 that meets it just west of the I-40 interchange. Distance about 2.0 miles on this road and another 2.0 miles on AZ-64/US-19 to the center of Williams. (This piece is a remnant of US-66.) No buildings of any kind are shown on the map at or near Williams Junction. Map info says the map date is 1989.
to CoastStarlight99: My Southwest Chief schedule says "Williams Jct. AZ (Gr. Cyn. Ry.)" A note reference in the Grand Canyon Railway timetable in the folder says "Free shuttle service between Williams Grand Canyon Railway station and Amtrak Williams Junction station."
to sbalax: I would say that in 1953 you would have stopped at Williams itself because that was before the line change was constructed.
to Southwest Chief: The station probably would have been torn down whenever the ATSF felt that its usage level no longer justified the property tax bill that ATSF had to pay on it. Whichever of the founding fathers made the statement that "the power to tax is the power to destroy" had no idea how resoundingly applicable his statement was to many now gone historical railroad structures.
About three years ago I rode the Grand Canyon Railroad. The Williams station is still there, in use by the GCRR and is a nice building, but it is not the Amtrak stop.
After my previous post, I found a statement that on the original line through Ash Fork the ruling grade between Ash Fork and Crookton was 3% up westbound.
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Posted by sbalax (Member # 2801) on :
It appears that there is AMTRAK Bus service from Williams to Flagstaff. It's shown as a half hour trip with a pretty long wait for the train to arrive (only checked Westbound). I wonder if you can arrange to use the Fray Marcos van to Williams Jct. if you aren't staying at the hotel. The Grand Canyon Railway operation in Williams is pretty slick. The town itself has some interesting remnants of the heyday of Route 66. And there's a great place for pie. Pine Tree Café?
Posted by Southwest Chief (Member # 1227) on :
Short story about Williams Junction.
I was on my way to California from Colorado, and stayed overnight in Williams. Amtrak had just added Williams Junction as a station and I was interested to see what was there.
I went to the then brand new Fray Marcos hotel to ask the guy behind the counter how to get to the train station. He said that the train doesn't come until the night or early morning. I said, I just wanted to see the "station". He said there was nothing there, but reluctantly gave me directions.
After a rather bad dirt road, and in the middle of the forest, I got to the tracks. There was an old ATSF Burro crane there on the siding. The station was nothing more than a slab of concrete, and there weren't any signs like there are now. In fact, I'm almost certain there were no lights either.
I then noticed the signals were green and much to my delight, two fast intermodal freights met right in front of me at Williams Junction.
Williams Junction is a great place to railfan, and Williams isn't too bad either, although the freights are limited to the few that go to Phoenix, but the Grand Canyon railway makes up for the lack of trains in Williams. Williams Junction however is very busy, and you'll see everything from intermodal to manifests to the Southwest Chief (however the Chief times are poor for railfanning)
Posted by CG96 (Member # 1408) on :
I would be tempted to say Churchill, MB, or Flin Flon, or Prince Rupert, BC. There is always Fairbanks, AK.
