...being a Mopac fan, I have some interest in the M-K-T, a companion road to the MoP on most of its route. And now I'm bold enough to post some questions... 1. How big was the Katy? 2. What kind of traffic was it know for? 3. What was its biggest and/or most common power in the steam and diesel eras? 4. Which color paint scheme lasted the longest? 5. What kind of shape was the road in when taken over by Uncle Pete via Mopac? 6. What happened to the Mo-Kan corridor trackage between Georgetown and ~Elgin, Texas? That's good for starters.
General Katy Questions 1. How big was the Katy? at the end it was over 3,000 miles with trackage rights from the UP it ran Nebraska to Kansas to Oklahoma into Texas and Trackage into Missouri. 2. What kind of traffic was it know for? The Katy hauled to my knowledge was general freight,grains,coal,rock,autos,gypsum(sheet rock),TOFC,carbin,glass,sand,steel,oil,among other things. 3. What was its biggest and/or most common power in the steam and diesel eras? Diesel late Katy (Whitman Green and Yellow era Biggest would have been SD40-2's,The most common GP40,GP38/-2,GP7,GP39-2,GP39-2(GP49 carbodies). Before this the most common would have been the F-units F-3A,B;F-7A,B;F9B's,FP-7's;then you had PA's and FA's an assortment of swicthers from Baldwin to General Motors.You had AS1600's,RS-3's,GP7's,and the list goes on and on. Steam I don't know for sure. 4. Which color paint scheme lasted the longest? I would say the red scheme Started with the first diesels until being phased out starting in 1972 it varied in shades from red to maroon to pink.This is when the Whitman Green and Yellow came in and lasted until the UP take over. 5. What kind of shape was the road in when taken over by Uncle Pete via Mopac? The Katy was in great physical shape and was in the black money wise the word was that Katy Industries just wanted out of the railroad bussiness which is what made Katy Industries. 6. What happened to the Mo-Kan corridor trackage between Georgetown and ~Elgin, Texas? T That's good for starters.[/QUOTE] I hope this helps out some. Fred I miss seeing the Screaming Eagle running in Kansas........
The most common steam locomotive was the 2-6-0 Mogul. The largest freight locomotive was the 2-8-2 Mikado. The largest passenger locomotive was the 4-6-2 Pacific. They also ran a lot of 4-6-0 Ten Wheelers and 2-8-0 Consolidations.
A lot of the Katy main in OK and KS was massively rebuilt in 1980- I saw evidence of this in northeastern OK by the piles of old crossties and the Conrail GP38s leased to haul MOW trains. This was about the time that the BN-Frisco merger took place, a merger that MKT incidentally tried in vain to halt. Very shortly after the Katy was merged into the MP (yes it was- by this time the MP was a paper subsidiary of UP ), Denison, TX lost its status as a Katy railroad town- the offices were closed, the dispatchers moved elsewhere, the shops at Ray Yard torn down, and the Dallas line via Greenville, TX was removed between Denison and Bells, TX. The office building still stands in Denison, but now it's used to house a flea market. Fortunately, the Denison depot is still there.
