A southbound CN freight passes the former Soo Line station in Waukesha, Wis., in 2012.
Brian Schmidt
Q How did Canadian National end up operating the former Soo Line route through Wisconsin. I thought the Soo was affiliated with Canadian Pacific. – Kirk Gobain, Dodge City, Kan.
A The Soo Line acquired the Milwaukee Road in 1985, sold off its own main line to Wisconsin Central Ltd. in 1987, and continued to use the former Milwaukee as its primary route out of Chicago.
In 2001, Canadian National purchased the WC, completing its southern route around the Great Lakes. – Brian Schmidt
There’s a key element missing here—since the late 1980s or early 1990s, CN had a haulage rights agreement with BN between Superior and Chicago (completing the route from western Canada to the U.S. Midwest). CN ended up moving traffic over WC rather than BNSF, which then made the acquisition of WC viable.
Kirk Gobain?? Well alrighty then. ??
But long before buying WC, CN, through its longtime US entity GTW, almost bought the Milwaukee Road. Soo won that contest.
WC business was built on serving the locals. The question then arises, with the trend of the big railroads discouraging single car industries along their main lines has CN continued to serve the industries or have those businesses been forced to go to trucks.
Not sure if this was a good move on Soo Line’s part. Had a friend that worked for Soo Line when this decision was made and he told me that they were giving up a lot of their industry in Wisconsin for a more direct route between Chicago and Minneapolis/St. Paul.
Irony abounds in the later day histories of the Milwaukee Road and the Soo Line.