The Genesee & Allegheny
Southern got its earliest roots from the formation of the Rochester
& Southern back in 1864. It started when Rochester wanted a railroad
to haul freight to and from Kodak, as well as farms and wineries in
the area. Capitol to due so, however, was almost non-existent, so Kodak,
farmers, and wineries jointly came up with $1.2 million dollars to start
up a railroad. In 1867, the right-of-way was started. The railroad was
to head from Rochester south to Caledonia, where 6 agricultural customers
were located. Interchange was set up with the New York Central Railway
in Rochester, NY, at their Goodman St. Yard. The line also rolled through
Henrietta, Scottsville, and Industry.
By 1871, the line was completed
and the first train, a 4-4-0 American C type coupled to a combine and
a coach headed south along this line to Caledonia. Many people were
waiting at Caledonia for this train and a ceremony including the breaking
of a ribbon was performed. A similar, but larger celebration, took place
in Rochester on the return trip. The next day, freight started being
shipped and the first freight train with another 4-4-0 American C type
was pulled north to Rochester from Caledonia, consisting of five grain
hoppers, two reefers, and a caboose with some high executives on board.
In 1887, large salt deposits
were discovered near Geneseo, NY, approximately 13.2 miles south of
Caledonia. Rochester & Southern immediately acted on the situation by
building a line south to Geneseo, which was completed in 1888. Salt
proved to be extremely profitable and the profits from this were astronomical.
To accommodate all of the extra trains, 3 more 4-4-0 American C types
were purchased, along with 100 salt hoppers. Around this time, the railroad
renamed to Genesee & Wyoming.
By 1892, profits had eased
down, so Genesee & Wyoming decided to put 50 of their salt car fleet
in storage. However, at the time, Genesee & Wyoming had no true yard
big enough to hold this, so they build one at the junction in Caledonia.
It featured 12 tracks, each 8000' feet long (roughly) costing $250,000.
This yard also served the purpose of interchanging cars with the New
York Central Peanut Line as well as the Lehigh Valley. Genesee &
Wyoming also interchanged with the Erie Raiload in Wadsworth.
In 1898, Corning wanted a
railroad to compete with the Erie Railroad due to unfair prices on shipments
and offered Genesee & Wyoming $400,000 if they could connect Corning.
To do this, Genesee & Wyoming build a subsidary that connected Corning
to Bath, known as the Bath & Hammondsport. This railroad was in deep
farming country, hauling much grain and other agricultural projects,
as well as glass products from Corning. Still, no connection existed
between Geneseo and Bath, however. This would soon change.
In 1904, the Dansville &
Mt. Morris Railroad Co. was created, hauling freight from Geneseo to
Bath. This also passed through rich farming country, as well as a new
plastics company in Mt. Morris. By 1911, the Dansville & Mt. Morris
and the Bath & Hammondsport were both wholly owned by Genesee & Wyoming.
During the 1920's, with
the huge stock market crash, many railroads went out of business. Genesee
& Wyoming, however, got lucky and became a subsidiary of New York Central,
which managed to keep from going bankrupt at this time. Because of this,
the 4-4-0 American Cs were retired and replaced with New York Central
equipment, such as 4-6-4 Hudsons or 2-8-2 Mikatos. Some of the aging
freight cars were also replaced with some of New York Central's own
cars. All of this was part of he original plan to purchase Genesee &
Wyoming.
In 1937, the deal with New
York Central fell through, leaving Genesee & Wyoming on it's own and
with brand-new practically free equipment. At this time, New York Central
also decided to abandon it's Hojack Line since it was upgrading it's
Chicago line with CTC, so Genesee & Wyoming purchased it for $6.7 million
dollars. This turned out to be a wise decision, as it now had a connection
with the Canadian Pacific Railroad, which did a lot of business with
Genesee & Wyoming. Plus, Genesee & Wyoming now had a connection to Syracuse,
which turned up the profits even more for Genesee & Wyoming. They also
connected with Oswego, the location of a massive power plant, which
needed constant coal trains to feed it (of which Genesee & Wyoming was
the hauler).
In the 1940's with the start
of World War II, Genesee & Wyoming played a key role hauling tanks,
armored vehicles, Jeeps, and other military equipment east for exporting.
Much of this came from Canadian Pacific's Detroit Terminal, where Ford
was producing tanks, armored vehicles, and such. To haul such heavy
freight, Genesee & Wyoming purchased ten 2-6-6-6 Alleghenys, five 2-8-8-2
Mallets, and five 4-6-6-4 Challengers, costing a total of $20 million
dollars.
With the end of the war
came time for expansion. Genesee & Wyoming purchased the Southern Tier
Line from Erie for cheap since the Erie was having financial troubles
and went bankrupt. This proved a success and Genesee & Wyoming made
tremendous profits by hauling fast freight from Niagara Falls at the
junction with Canadian Pacific (most Canadian Pacific trains originated
in Vancouver) to Croxton, NJ. To access the beginning of the Southern
Tier Line was a harsh battle, however. The route needed was New York
Central's Belt Line from Buffalo to Niagara Falls. However, because
the deal that fell through years ago (at which New York Central was
still angry about), New York Central offered it at a minimum of $25.8
million dollars. A large court debate in Washington occurred over this
with the ICC eventually saying that New York Central couldn't charge
more that $10 million dollars for the line. When Canadian Pacific heard
the news, they helped Genesee & Wyoming pay for this line, since it
would shave almost five hours off of the current time of service to
Binghamton, NY where they had a connection with Delaware & Hudson,
which would soon be under the wing of Canadian Pacific in the not too
distant future.
In 1953, Genesee & Wyoming
officials and stockholders felt a name change was necessary, so the
name was changed. Out of 17 possible names, Genesee & Allegheny Southern
was picked. Shops immediately went to work on repainting equipment while
the head office was busy changing document names and registering various
items with the FRA and IRS. After a year, the name change had been completed.
By 1957, Genesee & Allegheny
Southern was in a desperate need for motive power, so they decided to
purchase a new locomotive that would forever be a milestone: the diesel.
Genesee & Allegheny Southern purchased 15 S-2s from ALCO for yard switching
and 15 GP9s from EMD for freights. These units proved so successful
that Genesee & Allegheny Southern retired all of their Challengers and
Mallets. The Alleghenys, however, remained in service for use on drag
freights (they were very good at hauling unit salt trains). This was
going to be the start of a tradition not broken for more that 50 years.
In 1963, Genesee & Allegheny
Southern decided to purchase the New York, Susquehanna, & Western when
they started running into financial difficulties aafter they lost an
intemrodal contract to the New York Central. This gave them tracks south
from Syracuse down to Little Ferry, NJ, and Croxton, NJ. Since the New
York, Susquehanna, & Western was still running steam-only, Genesee &
Allegheny Southern purchased 10 GP18s, 12 RS1s and 5 SW9s to deiselize
the ex-New York Susquehanna, & Western.
By 1969, railroads were
starting to look towards piggyback freight. Genesee & Allegheny Southern
was hesitant at first, but seeing that both New York Central and Pennsylvania
were successful with this, they decided to start transcontinental intermodal
service with Canadian Pacific. Genesee & Allegheny Southern also decided
to purchase 20 SD38s to haul intermodal freights. Another acquisition
was five GE 44-Tonners, which Genesee & Allegheny Southern leased out
to the Kodak Railroad. Things were starting to look bright for Genesee
& Allegheny Southern.
In 1978, Genesee & Allegheny
Southern purchased Conrail's Williamsport Line from Binghamton, NY,
to Williamsport, PA. There, they interchanged cars with Conrail. They
also purchased Delaware & Hudson's mainline from Binghamton to Albany
for access to Penn Central's massive Selkirk Yard (trains went through
the interchange at Voorheeseville, NY). They also gained the Mohawk
Yard, which was located near many chemical plants, bringing in some
extra revenue for Genesee & Allegheny Southern. This required many engines
and since some engines were getting elderly, Genesee & Allegheny Southern
purchased 10 GP35s, 35 GP38-3s (rebuilt in Schenectady to Dash 3 standards),
48 SD40-2s, & upgraded 26 ex-Southern Pacific SD45T-2s (which were wrecked)
to Dash 3 standards (then known as SD45-3s). However, they also retired
and/or sold off all GP9s, GP18s, SW9s, RS1s, and S-2s.
By 1985, Genesee & Allegheny
Southern had purchased trackage rights on the Buffalo Line of Conrail
to gain access to the massive Enola Yard. Since Genesee & Allegheny
Southern had retired and/or sold off all of their elderly power earlier,
they purchased 19 GP40-2s and 37 CF7ACs. The CF7ACs proved good for
yard and local service, so Genesee & Allegheny Southern purchased them
from Santa Fe.
In 1990, Genesee & Allegheny
Southern purchased 3 E8As for executive and excursion purposes in addition
to many old coaches for use on the OCS trian after refurbishign and
painting. They also purchased 9 S23-7Rs (Super 7s) to haul van trains
to and from Croxton, NJ. These super-modified locomotives proved great
in light intermodal service, especially van trains.
In 1993, Genesee & Allegheny
Southern purchased 32 GP15-1s, all ex-Conrail, to make room for the
recently purchased the Harrisburg Line and the Lehigh Line. Part of
this deal included Oak Island Yard, which Conrail gave up in favor of
their Fresh Pond Yard. However, the best part of this all was that they
had a connection now in New Castle, PA, with Hocking Valley Railroad,
giving them extremely fast Chicago-New York service. Both the Hocking
Valley Railroad and the Genesee & Allegheny Southern liked this deal
and it became their main source of revenue by the mid-late 90's.
In 1997, Genesee & Allegheny
Southern rearranged the track layout in Buffalo, which included a new
fly-over and tracks that were no longer shared with Conrail. This cleared
up a lot of traffic for both Conrail and Genesee & Allegheny Southern.
It also prevented periodical collisions on the line, which clogged up
the whole Buffalo area for days on end.
In 1999, both Hanjin and
APL decided to start shipping from Vancouver to New York via Canadian
Pacific and Genessee & Allegheny Southern. This brought a tremendous
increase in revenue for Genesee & Allegheny Southern. By the end of
1999, several daily Hanjin and APL stack trains (each around 2 miles
in length) were being run per day.
In early 2001, they double
tracked their entire Southern Tier Line, added 9 sets of crossovers,
and installed both ABS and CTC to this line with the dispatcher being
located in Albany in the same building as Conrail so that they could
communicate better in terms of train locations. The total cost for this
massive project was $24.8 million dollars ($1.2 million being for trackage
rights over CSX during the rebuilding project). They also purchased
64 new MP15DCs. After this, G&AS purchased both CEFX and HLCX, merged
them together, and renamed it NLSX (National Leasing Service). This
brought in huge amounts of revenue for G&AS and they soon purchased
more locomotives to add to the leasing pool, as well as many junk cars
railroads wanted to get rid of (of which NLSX rebuilt some and used
others for parts to help with the rebuilds).
In
mid 2001, CSX was replacing ties on a large portion of the Chicago Line
between Buffalo and Albany, so G&AS provided their route to CSX traffic.
The cost for this was $29.2 million dollars (The price was so high due
to that fact that 53 trains a day used the temporary trackage rights
and the work lasted 3 months). They then took that money and purchased
28 C40-9Ws after testing some from Norfolk Southern. They also purchased
38 SD70MACs, and leased 13 SD80MACs from NLSX on a long term contract
with the option to buy. Also at this time, all of the elderly engines
retired in 1978 not sold off were scrapped (except for 2 GP9s, 1 GP18,
3 RS-1s, and 1 S-2, which were donated to local railroad/transportation
museums).
In mid 2002, G&AS double
tracked their line from Binghamton to Albany, installing numerous extra
crossovers and ABS and CTC with the central dispatcher still being located
in Albany. Also, G&AS put in and order for 22 more C40-9Ws from GE due
to the steadily lengthening intermodal trains (delivered in January
of 2003). However, by December 2002, the double tracking project of
the Binghamton-Albany route was completed and the crossovers are installed,
as well as signal bridges and CTC (the Albany office is busy with an
expansion to it's office to make room for the new dispatcher's desk
for this area).
In January of 2003, G&AS
purchased the ex-Monogahela Route from CSX for coal revenue and access
to Pittsburgh. To confincate for this, G&AS purchased 60 CW44ACs for
coal service, 50 SD70s and 35 SD70Is for intermodal service, and 25
C39-8s for autorack (ML) trains. They also started running intermodal
trains and autorack trains via the NJ&P from Williamsport, PA, to Sscranton,
PA. Low priority trains started running via the Lehigh Line instead.
The NJ&P Line was double tracked from Williamsport, PA, to Scranton,
PA, where G&AS's Scranton-Easton connecter line was in place. G&AS also
purchased the former Norfolk Southern line from Reading to Philadelphia,
causing a rise in intermodal and autorack traffic (Intermodal came form
Morrisville, autoracks came from Twin Oaks).
By
mid 2003, G&AS had stopped buying lines for the moment and focused
on customer service instead. G&AS, HVR, and NJP came together to
lease 120 Automax's for use on Automax trains hauling Honda's imported
from Japan. G&AS also leased 800 60' Gunderson Hi-Cube Single Door
boxcars from CRLE for better service to their customers. G&AS also
reprogrammed the software in their CW40-9's to let 4400 HP out ofthese
units. G&AS also decided to start steam excursions using coaches
leased form FCR to earn some extra revenue and establish better public
relations. Now, what is to become of the G&AS?