St Croix Valley Railroad Company summary
The St Croix Valley Railroad Company (SCXY) is a Class III short line railroad that operates in eastern Minnesota. It’s owned by KBN Incorporated that also owns the Minnesota Northern Railroad and the Dakota Northern Railroad. The St. Croix Valley Railroad uses 33 miles of former Northern Pacific Railway track from Hinckley to North Branch.
History
The St. Croix Valley Railroad operates a section of the ex-NP “Skally” main line from Minneapolis to Duluth, Minn., and Superior, Wisconsin. The 1970 merger into Burlington Northern resulted in the line being downgraded with traffic moving to the former Great Northern Railway’s route between the Twin Cities and Twin Ports. By 1989, the Skally Line was cut south of North Branch due to abandonment. BNSF Railway, BN’s successor, put the Hinckley-North Branch section up for sale in 1997 with RailAmerica the highest bidder. On September 1, 1997, the St. Croix Valley Railroad began operations. Since 2000, the railroad has been under ownership of KBN Inc.
Operations
The Titan Lansing sand plant in North Branch serves as the largest customer to the St. Croix Valley Railroad Company. The plant opened in 2013 with sand trucked from Grantsburg, Wis., where workers dry, sort, screen and divide the sand into four sizes. Oil and gas producers use the silica sand for hydraulic fracturing and certain industrial processes. Two silos load sand into railcars which the SCXY carries to the BNSF interchange in Hinckley. Other customers along the railroad include Interstate Energy Partner’s propane facility in Rush City and Zinpro Corporation at North Branch, which the latter produces animal nutrition products and receives about 100 cars of chemicals a year.
The St. Croix Valley Railroad has three EMD diesel locomotives: one GP9 and two SD40-2 rebuilt from SD45s. The roster was supplied by Independent Locomotive Services, a locomotive leaser, dealer, and repair company. The fleet’s paint scheme serves as a tribute to the former Northern Pacific Railway including a version of the ex-NP’s monad logo, with the words “St. Croix Valley Railroad” in place of Northern Pacific and “The Skally Line” slogan beneath the logo.
Interchange is made with BNSF at Hinckley.
Read more about the St. Croix Valley Railroad Company in Trains’ April 2015 issue.
I’ll be pedantic – SCXY operates most of the extant Skally Line (the former St. Paul & Duluth), but Minnesota Commercial Railway (MNNR) operates the other remaining 8 miles between Vadnais Heights and Hugo, MN as well as the ex-NP Mulberry Line (Minneapolis & Duluth) from White Bear Lake to northeast Minneapolis.