Portland & Western Railroad operates a regional system of 523 miles in northwestern Oregon providing quality railroad service to more than 135 customers. The company's rail lines are concentrated principally in Oregon's renowned Willamette Valley along a 100-mile south west of Interstate 5 between Eugene and Portland, and from Portland along the Columbia River to the Pacific Ocean at Astoria.

This railroad is a wholly-owned subsidiaries of Genesee & Wyoming Inc., a leading operator of regional railroads, switching services and rail car leasing based in Greenwich, Connecticut. GWI's family of companies has extensive operations in the Northeast, the Gulf Coast, Midwest, West and Northwest, and an interest in Canada, Mexico, Bolivia and substantial rail lines in Australia. GWI is a publicly held company and its stock is traded on NASDAQ under the initials GNWR.

Willamette & Pacific (reporting marks WPRR) was formed in 1993 to lease 185 miles of low-density Southern Pacific branch lines extending west from Albany, Oregon, and north and south from Corvallis, Oregon, located about 12 miles west of Albany. Southern Pacific granted trackage rights to W&P for 40 miles over its main line from Albany and Eugene where the two carriers interchange most of the traffic that W&P originated or terminated. W&P's lease was for 20 years; it began operating trains on February 22, 1993.

From the onset of operations in 1993, Willamette & Pacific set about to accomplish three major goals:

     - Arrest and reverse deterioration of the physical plant
     - Improve service
     - Grow volume

By the end of 1994, W&P's first full year of operation, carloads had grown by more than 20% as businesses in western Oregon began to respond to improvements in their local rail service and aggressive marketing tactics. By the end of 1996, traffic had grown by more than 35% and W&P began to experience, for the first time, quarters in which volumes exceeded 10,000 cars.

Willamette & Pacific's route map somewhat resembles a cross. The main post is comprised of the West Side District stretching from Monroe, in southern Benton County, northward 78.6 miles to Newberg, in Yamhill County. The transverse piece represents the 74.7-mile Toledo District linking Albany, the seat of Linn County, with Toledo, a paper mill town in Lincoln County nestled in the foothills of the Coast Range, a few miles inland from the Pacific Ocean. The Toledo line crosses the West Side at Corvallis, home of Oregon State University. Between Corvallis and Toledo the railroad winds through the wet and rugged coastal mountains on an alignment laid out in the 1880's.

One other shortline is captive to W&P, connecting at V&S Jct., just north of the town of Independence. This is an isolated segment of the Willamette Valley Railway which operates principally in the eastern Willamette Valley on trackage leased from Southern Pacific. At V&S Jct., WVR has less than a mile of track remaining of what was once the 40-mile Valley & Siletz Railroad. Although currently devoid of commercial customers, the V&S vestige does host a two-stall locomotive maintenance shop, now privately owned, and offices of WVR.

During the summer of 1993, W&P constructed a car repair facility at Albany, consisting of a reinforced concrete slab and a car port-like cover. In the fall of that year, construction began on a locomotive repair facility, also at Albany. The 13,600 square-foot building, opened in March 1994, can accommodate four diesel locomotives inside at one time. Two tracks pass through the building with doors at each end. Illuminated concrete inspection trenches between the rails of both tracks allow for safe work under locomotives. One track is equipped with a drop table, permitting removal of locomotive wheel sets (an axle and its wheels), along with the accompanying electric motor surrounding the axle. Together, an axle and motor are called "combinations." W&P has a 50-inch wheel lathe for truing axle-mounted wheels which accepts combinations as well. A 20-ton capacity overhead crane travels the full length of the facility, spanning both tracks. Just southwest of the shop, W&P has built a state-of-the-art fueling facility with underground storage capacity for 20,000 gallons of diesel fuel. The Albany facility maintains 32 WPRR locomotives and does some occasional work for other railroads, including truing wheel-sets trucked in by Union Pacific, the nation's largest carrier.

For its initial one and half years of operation, W&P had a northern outlet to the Portland gateway. Southern Pacific allowed W&P temporary trackage rights from Newberg, 24 miles to SP's Brooklyn yard in southeast Portland. This route proved to be fundamentally important in developing new business for W&P. But, on August 19, 1994, SP closed down the line because of a bridge maintenance problem.

One day short of a year later, on August 18, 1995, the Portland & Western Railroad (reporting marks PNWR) made its debut by leasing the SP trackage between Newberg and Brooklyn, along with all other remaining SP branches in the Portland metropolitan area, a total slightly exceeding 53 miles. Like W&P, P&W's lease is for an initial term of 20 years with renewal options. In order to restore the Newberg-Brooklyn line as a through route to the Portland gateway, P&W immediately commenced repairs to the first trestle east of Springbrook which had been the weak link causing closure. Repairs were quickly effected and the through line reopened September 15, 1995.

As originally constituted, P&W acquired 15.5 miles from Newberg to Cook, naming it the West Side District. Cook is an intermediate point on SP's Tillamook Branch, which runs 29.3 miles from Willsburg Jct. to Schefflin where ownership of the remaining track to Tillamook changes to the Port of Tillamook Bay Railroad. P&W's lease to Schefflin extends only 28.4 miles from Harrison Street crossing in Milwaukie (MP 741.6), with trackage rights between that point and Brooklyn yard. This line became P&W's Tillamook District. Another SP line, the West Side-Seghers Branch running 12.4 miles from Hillsboro to Stimson-Forestex, completed the lease package as the Seghers District. Operations and maintenance personnel were based in the former SP Hillsboro depot, with W&P at Albany providing motive power, dispatching, customer service, and administrative expertise. Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railroad jointly operated with P&W between Greton and St. Marys, and between St. Marys and Schefflin on the Tillamook District. Between Hillsboro and Schefflin, the Port of Tillamook Bay Railroad also shared the Tillamook line with P&W and BNSF.

Portland &Western's Tillamook District includes a portion of one of Oregon's first rail lines. In 1867, the Oregon Central Railroad Company had been incorporated to build a railroad southwesterly from Portland, starting on the west side of the Willamette River. Ground was broken on April 15, 1868, projecting a line toward Forest Grove and McMinnville which required heavy construction through the hills west of Portland. After overcoming a number of problems, both physical and financial, the first 20 miles from Portland to Hillsboro were completed December 18, 1871. That portion of P&W from Lombard Street crossing in Beaverton to Hillsboro is part of the old Oregon Central.

On October 1, 1995, Portland & Western doubled its mileage by leasing 53 miles of BNSF branches west and southwest of Portland. The BNSF trackage included two orphaned branches accessible only by trackage rights over P&W (SP), and the northern half of the old Oregon Electric Railway extending south almost to Salem. BNSF's orphaned segments included its 5.4-mile branch between Hillsboro and Forest Grove, which P&W now calls the Forest Grove District, and an 11.8-mile line from Banks, on the POTB, to Bendemeer, which P&W identifies as its United Railways District. In order to reach Banks, 4.5 miles west of Schefflin, P&W inherited BNSF's trackage rights over the POTB between these points. The northerly half of the OE started at Greton, a junction on the Tillamook District, running south about 32 miles to Quinaby, 4.9 miles north of Oregon's capital city of Salem. This line now comprises P&W's Oregon Electric District. The BNSF acquisition included a building at St. Marys which is used today as the operating and marketing/sales hub of P&W, with maintenance activities remaining at Hillsboro. Five miles of Centralized Traffic Control between St. Marys and Greton once necessary for shared SP/BN use, was rendered unnecessary when P&W became the sole carrier representing the interests of the larger lines. P&W successfully applied to the Federal Railroad Administration to retire the CTC which was accomplished in early 1997.

On July 12, 1997, Portland &Western nearly doubled it's mileage again by purchasing 91.7 miles of BNSF's branch from Portland to Astoria. P&W bought the trackage from a point near Willbridge, where the branch diverged from BNSF's main line in northwest Portland, to Tongue Point, former site of a naval seaplane base three miles east of Astoria. The line between Tongue Point and the end of track at the Port of Astoria, a distance of five miles, previously had been donated by the BNSF to the City of Astoria. The Astoria District of P&W actively serves the Port of St. Helens, a Columbia River facility about 30 miles downriver from Portland, two paper mills, three petroleum depots, a plywood mill, two chemical plants, two sawmills, and several other customers. P&W has a train crew and resident composite mechanic based at St. Helens, and another train crew quartered at Linnton. Maintenance of Way personnel work out of Hillsboro. When P&W began operating the line, no service had been provided beyond Wauna, 69.2 miles west of Willbridge, for 1 1/2 years due to a huge slide blocking the railroad near Brownsmead, about 18 miles upriver from Astoria. Restoration of rail service to Astoria is a goal of P&W. To achieve that goal, P&W needs a commitment for long-term traffic to help offset the expense of removing the landslide, which covers the track to a depth of 20 to 25 feet for 800 to 1,000 feet. An agreement to operate over the City of Astoria's trackage to reach the port also needs to be negotiated. Although the P&W operates into Union Pacific's Brooklyn yard in southeast Portland, the Astoria line, which begins in the northwest part of the city, is isolated from the rest of P&W. Accordingly, P&W relies on BNSF to move, at cost, its locomotives and maintenance of way equipment between the disjoined segments of its property.

That portion of the Astoria District from Willbridge to Goble, 35.2 miles, is one of the most historic rail lines in the state, having been opened for traffic by Northern Pacific Railroad Company on October 3, 1884, as part of its route between Portland and Tacoma. At Goble, an NP ferry carried cars and locomotives across the bridge-less Columbia River to Kalama. For the next 25 years, this was how north/south rail travel was conducted between the Puget Sound and Portland. On June 25, 1908, NP linked Vancouver and Portland with 10 miles of new track featuring massive bridges across the Columbia and Willamette Rivers. A 28.9-mile branch line had been built in 1903 connecting Vancouver with Kalama. With the opening of the bridges in 1908, it was upgraded to mainline status and the Goble-Willbridge line, which had been extended to Astoria, became a branch.

All together, including eight miles of trackage rights, Portland & Western operates on nearly 186 miles of track, which will increase to 212 miles when service to Astoria is resumed. In 1996, its first full year of operation, traffic was nearly 10% higher than expected. One other shortline, the state-owned POTB, is captive to P&W which acts as the intermediate carrier between POTB, Union Pacific and BNSF. W&P and P&W have teamed up to create daily through service, north and south, via their connection at Newberg. Creation of P&W, along with the Astoria line, has added six more Oregon counties to the service territory of the sister lines. Added were the counties of Columbia, Clatsop, Washington, Multnomah, Clackamas and Marion. Already served were Lane, Linn, Lincoln, Benton, Polk and Yamhill Counties.

On September 11, 1996, Union Pacific Railroad acquired Southern Pacific. For W&P and P&W this seeded a relationship with a new trading partner. The acquisition of SP has left the West with just two major carriers: UP and BNSF.

Willamette & Pacific and Portland & Western were combined under one railroad name and called Portland & Western Railroad in December 2000. With the "new" railroad name came a revised railroad herald. The familiar "W&P" initials and identity are disappearing and being replaced with new "P&W" on the long hood and nose of the railroad's locomotive fleet.

Portland & Western expanded once again in December 2002 by leasing the southern half of BNSF's Oregon Electric line from Salem to Eugene. In addition to gaining access to shippers in the lower Willamette Valley, the railroad was also able to remove traffic off the scenic but difficult crossing of Rex Hill, to a longer but flatter routing on the Oregon Electric.

In partnership with Portland's TriMet public transportation system, the railroad has been involved in the planning of a commuter line in Washington County from Beaverton to Wilsonville. The line is scheduled to open in 2006.

In addition, Portland & Western has partnered with the Oregon Department of Transportation to run the RDC equipped Lewis & Clark Explorer from Linnton to Astoria to commemorate the Lewis & Clark bicentennial.

From its many parts, Portland & Western has crafted a single system dedicated to serving its shippers and growing new business.

Written & Edited by Bob Melbo and NorthWestRails.com

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Last Update: January 4, 2005