SP the Southern Pacific Story How The Empire was made 1929- Southern Pacific is granted the right to control the Cotton Belt Railroad (St Louis South Western SSW) as a subsidiary but it must remain independent for now. 1963- Southern Pacific and Santa Fe railroads both attempt to take control of the Western Pacific both roads are denied this merger as it would make them too powerful in California. 1980- The Rock Railroad (Chicago Rock Island & Pacific) is in shambles. And is about to sell off itself. Management of the Southern Pacific decides they are interested in the road and ask the government to approve a merger between the two roads. The merger is approved and The Rock becomes the first large road to be merged into their empire. However Southern Pacific inherits The Rock’s massive debt. 1982- The Union Pacific begins taking interest in the Western Pacific and Missouri Pacific lines and Southern Pacific steps up to battle them for Missouri Pacific. The government decides that UP will get WP and SP will get MP. Missouri Pacific also had some debt so SP inherited that as well. 1983- Southern Pacific suffers a major workers strike. This is a major setback for SP who is trying to eliminate the Debt it inherited from The Rock and Missouri Pacific and thus the debt remains. 1986- Southern Pacific merged into Santa Fe industries with plans to merge with The Santa Fe Railway to become SPSF Southern Pacific Santa Fe Railway. The government denies this merger as it would create a southern monopoly and thus Santa Fe Industries put Southern Pacific up for sale. 1988- Rio Grande Industries (parent company of D&RGW Denver and Rio Grande Western) bought the SP from Santa Fe Industries and inherited all the debt from them. Rio Grande decided that the combined company would retain the name Southern Pacific as it was more recognized in the business world and would benefit them more. Cotton Belt was still left independent for the time being. To eliminate debt The Golden West Service is created. This program included the sale of freight cars from SP, Cotton Belt, The Rock, MP and Rio Grande to make money. This eliminates most of the company’s debt so that it could move forward easier. Within months SP begins to make large profits. In this same year the Union Pacific purchased the MKT (Missouri-Kansas and Texas) 1991- Southern Pacific adopts a new style of lettering know as Speed Lettering. This is the style that Rio Grande had. They decided this would be how they left their mark on SP since they were the ones who bought SP and not the other way around. 1992- Southern Pacific decides to unify its image and Cotton Belt is merged in. Speed Lettering is beginning to make its way on the system. 1995- Southern Pacific begins merger talks with the C&NW (Chicago and Northwestern). After months of these talks the Interstate Commerce Commission approves the merger and C&NW joins the ever expanding SP Empire. In this same year Burlington Northern and Santa Fe railroads decide to merge and they become BNSF (Burlington Northern Santa Fe). Union Pacific suffers heavily from these mergers and begins to fall quickly into debt as they cannot compete effectively with SP or BNSF. 1999- Union Pacific has been suffering heavily for years and Southern Pacific moves in. They propose a merger to the Surface Transportation Board (the ICC’s replacement) and on August 31, 1999 it is approved and Southern Pacific’s empire is now complete. 2010- By now all cars sold to create The Golden West Service have been repurchased by the Southern Pacific. Southern Pacific is now an Empire 8 large roads strong, The Rock, Missouri Pacific, Western Pacific, Rio Grande, MKT, Cotton Belt, Chicago & North Western, and Union Pacific are all now a part of the largest Railroad in the United States today, the Southern Pacific. Please feel free to comment on it. I tried to be realistic with my story line. Let me know what you all think.
The problem with this scenario is that SP becomes what UP is today...so SP would be disliked by some for the same reasons UP is today.
I still say that the way that the SSW got most of the Rock was better than your scenario, they got it for less and did not get any of the debt, plus did not get the lines that would have been spun off anyways into a regional/class 3...
the reason i chose to buy the ROCK instead of having it happen the way it did was for many reasons... 1. i wanted ROCK to be an OFFICIAL part of SP's heritage so that it would warant a heritgae unit to be made in it's honor, 2 i had allready bought numerous Golden West Service cars and did not want to get rid of them thus i had to figure a way for SP to have some big debt to eliminate and if the bought the ROCK (due to a bad management choice) we would have that debt i needed
eh i see it as payback anyways no matter what there will allways be dislike of every road by someone out there... it is unavoidable so i simply ignored it.
I'll ditto Blackwidow's statement. Would love to see SP equipment running around the Southwest as it once did; instead of UP
Interesting logic there. I may have to steal some of that, though I may change it slightly to leave the trio in the West...
I've posted this before in the SP modelers group and elsewhere on the board, but I'll repost here. I'm modelling SP in spirit. A freelance What if where the Rock Island line to Denver was never torn up and the SP was divided up similar to how NS and CSX divided up Conrail. The TransCon over Donner and the Coast line into LA and the Modoc route in California and the Rio Grande In addition, in my World, The company then bought up CORP and P&W (and Iowa Interstate and Kyle and whatever other route was needed to make this work) and with some trackage rights, created another Western Transcon route From Chicago to Denver, Salt Lake and over Donner with access to The Bay Area, LA and Portland (and Tillamook and Coos Bay and Astoria). The deal with UP forced the creation of terminal railroads similar to what Conrail is now so they have access to the ports. The name of my railroad is the Chicago, Denver and Central Pacific. A nod to SP's History. The UP was all too willing to get rid of older SP and Rio Grande power, so even into the 2000s the Central Pacific is running Tunnel motors, 45s, SD9s and whatever it can get it's hands on in any number of schemes. It also means they are buying into remotoring such as EMD's ECO. So, it's not Called the SP, it's actually goes back to SP's predecessor. Incidently, I'm thinking the terminal railroad in California may be the Sac Northern or something similar as a nod to Western Pacific history. Though that doesn't cover LA
There we go much like you did that one model earlier in this thread:tb-cool: But I would leave the Western Pacific and Denver Rio Grande in the mix as they were. Don't need the SP with a bad name as UP has; do we:tb-wink: Hey so at that rate the Donner Pass would still be a part of the SP tracks. SWEET!!!
BNSF SP UP. (Much as I hate to say it around here, they do have a good heritage program, and they did put a Challenger on the Circus train, so they can't be ALL bad, just mostly) The issue I see, even without SP, DRGW, and MP, even CNW, UP was still doing decently well with MKT, and WP, I don't see them being in Hardship under a larger SP emprie, for my thinking, and I could see CNW going to UP, if only because SP needed that time to put its house in order, or the Rock debt making the CNW apprehensive to buy in or be bought out. So I guess for my book, an even split between them of what UP is now, and the merger that you have, or the one in real life, were shot down by the ICC ruling that -P didn't need the financial help, and the merger was too much of a monopy on the West. But I see no reason not to spread some well earned spite at ol' Uncle Pete... Whoops! Make it a quartet, I forgot about KCS.
Well what im saying happens is UP gets some bad management shortly after the MKT merger much like SP seemed to have in real life and thus UP goes down the wrong track and never recovers plus due to SP and BNSF's reliability they are choosen by customers over the now unreliable UP due to their bad management
