| Overview | |
|---|---|
| Headquarters | Newport |
| Reporting mark | POVA |
| Locale | Eastern Washington Northern Idaho |
| Dates of operation | 1979–present |
| Predecessor | Milwaukee Road |
| Technical | |
| Track gauge | 4 ft 8+1⁄2 in (1,435 mm) |
| Length | 41 miles (66 km) |
| Other | |
| Website | http://povarr.com |
Pend Oreille Valley Railroad | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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The Pend Oreille Valley Railroad( reporting mark POVA) is a shortline railroad located in Usk, in northeast Washington.
The POVA serves the communities of Usk, Dalkena, Newport, Oldtown, Priest River, Laclede and has trackage rights from Dover-Sandpoint via the Union Pacific Railroad. [1]
The Route from Usk to Newport is former Milwaukee Road trackage and Newport-Dover is former Great Northern RY trackage. [2]
The line used to go to Metaline Falls but was abandoned north of Usk in 2016
The line was built by the Idaho and Washington Northern Railroad between 1907 and 1911. The Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Paul and Pacific Railroad (MILW) acquired the line in 1916.
The MILW entered financial difficulty in the 1970s and the Newport - Metaline Falls section was sold to Port of Pend Oreille following the company's downsizing. The Port of Pend Oreille established the Pend Oreille Valley Railroad and contracted railroad holding company Kyle Railways to manage the POVA. Freight service began on October 1, 1979, and the Port of Pend Oreille took over the POVA's management from Kyle Railways in 1984. On March 3, 1998, the Newport - Dover section was acquired from BNSF, along with 7 miles of trackage rights between Dover and the interchange yard at North Sandpoint.
Beginning in 1981, the North Pend Oreille Valley Lions Club worked with the POVA to operate a seasonal excursion train service on several weekends in the summer and fall.
The 20-mile (32 km) round trip ran from Ione to Metaline Falls along the spectacular Box Canyon, passing through several tunnels and crossing several bridges and wooden trestles. The passenger cars consisted of 3 standard coaches as well as 3 open-air cars and a caboose with some equipment borrowed from the Inland NW Railway Historical Society.
Financial issues caused the excursion train service to cease operations in October 2016, as upkeep and inspections became cost prohibitive. [3] The local Rotary Club sponsored a new excursion train on a 9-mile (14 km) route from Newport to Dalkena that debuted in 2017. [4]
Pend Oreille County is a county located in the northeast corner of the U.S. state of Washington, along the Canada–US border. As of the 2020 census, the population was 13,401. The county seat and largest city is Newport.
Sandpoint is the largest city in, and the county seat of, Bonner County, Idaho, United States. Its population was 9,777 as of the 2022 census.
Ione is a town in Pend Oreille County, Washington, United States. The population was 428 at the 2020 census.
The Pend Oreille River is a tributary of the Columbia River, approximately 130 miles (209 km) long, in northern Idaho and northeastern Washington in the United States, as well as southeastern British Columbia in Canada. In its passage through British Columbia its name is spelled Pend-d'Oreille River. It drains a scenic area of the Rocky Mountains along the U.S.-Canada border on the east side of the Columbia. The river is sometimes defined as the lower part of the Clark Fork, which rises in western Montana. The river drains an area of 66,800 square kilometres (25,792 sq mi), mostly through the Clark Fork and its tributaries in western Montana and including a portion of the Flathead River in southeastern British Columbia. The full drainage basin of the river and its tributaries accounts for 43% of the entire Columbia River Basin above the confluence with the Columbia. The total area of the Pend Oreille basin is just under 10% of the entire 258,000-square-mile (670,000 km2) Columbia Basin. Box Canyon Dam is currently underway on a multimillion-dollar project for a fish ladder.
Milwaukee Road 261 is a class "S3" 4-8-4 "Northern" type steam locomotive built by the American Locomotive Company (ALCO) in Schenectady, New York in July 1944 for the Milwaukee Road (MILW). It was used for heavy mainline freight and passenger work until being retired by the MILW in 1956.
The Wisconsin and Southern Railroad is a Class II regional railroad in Southern Wisconsin and Northeastern Illinois currently operated by Watco. It operates former Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Paul and Pacific Railroad and Chicago and North Western Railway (C&NW) trackage, mostly acquired by the state of Wisconsin in the 1980s.
The EMD SD9 is a model of diesel locomotive built by General Motors Electro-Motive Division between January 1954 and June 1959. An EMD 567C 16-cylinder engine generated 1,750 horsepower (1.30 MW). Externally similar to its predecessor, the SD7, the SD9 was built with the improved and much more maintainable 567C engine.
The Colville National Forest is a U.S. National Forest located in northeastern Washington state. It is bordered on the west by the Okanogan–Wenatchee National Forest and the Kaniksu National Forest to the east. The forest also borders Little Pend Oreille National Wildlife Refuge and the Lake Roosevelt National Recreation Area.
The Mount Hood Railroad is a heritage and shortline freight railroad located in Hood River, Oregon, 60 miles (97 km) east of Portland, Oregon, United States.
The Finger Lakes Railway is a Class III railroad in the Finger Lakes region of New York. The company began operations on July 23, 1995, and operates in Onondaga, Cayuga, Seneca, Ontario, Schuyler and Yates counties. The FGLK operates 18 diesel locomotives on 167 miles (269 km) of ex-Conrail trackage, formerly owned by the New York Central Railroad, the Pennsylvania Railroad and the Lehigh Valley Railroad. Between 2001 and 2013, the railroad operated a heritage railroad known as the Finger Lakes Scenic Railway which offered passenger train excursions.
The Kyle Railroad is a regional railroad line that runs from North Central Kansas into Eastern Colorado. It is based in Phillipsburg, Kansas and runs on 556 miles (895 km) of track, mostly the former Chicago, Rock Island and Pacific Railroad's Chicago to Denver main line. The Kyle was owned by RailAmerica from 2002 to 2012. Genesee & Wyoming Inc. bought RailAmerica in late 2012. As of 2023, KYLE holds 556 total miles, has a maximum capacity of 286,000 gross pounds per railcar. KYLE also has two interchanges: BNSF(Courtland, Kansas and Concordia, Kansas); Union Pacific.
The International Selkirk Loop is a 280-mile-long (450 km) scenic highway in the U.S. states of Idaho and Washington, as well as the Canadian province of British Columbia. The loop encircles the Selkirk Mountain Range, and offers several side trips aside from the main route. Included on the loop is the Kootenay Lake Ferry, the longest free ferry in the world. The portion of the loop in the United States has been designated an All-American Road by the United States Department of Transportation.
State Route 31 (SR 31) is a Washington state highway located entirely in Pend Oreille County. The highway, which is 26.79 miles (43.11 km) long, starts at an intersection with SR 20 in Tiger and travels north to the Canada–US border north of Metaline Falls. At the border, SR 31 becomes British Columbia Highway 6 (BC 6). The route parallels the Pend Oreille River for most of its route and the primary functions of the highway is to serve and connect Tiger, Ione, Metaline and Metaline Falls with British Columbia.
The Reading Blue Mountain and Northern Railroad, sometimes shortened to Reading and Northern Railroad, is a regional railroad in eastern Pennsylvania. With a headquarters in Port Clinton, the RBMN provides freight service on over 400 miles (640 km) of track. Its mainline consists of the Reading Division between Reading and Packerton and the Lehigh Division between Lehighton and Dupont. This mainline gives the RBMN a direct route from Reading to Scranton, the first such route to exist under the control of a single railroad. Founded in 1983 to take over from Conrail on the ex-Pennsylvania Railroad Schuylkill Branch between Reading and Hamburg, the railroad quickly grew over the next several decades to become the largest privately-owned Class II railroad in the United States. Its main freight cargo is anthracite coal, but also sees significant shipments in frac sand, forest products, petrochemicals and minerals, food and agricultural products, metals, and consumer products.
The Vermont Railway is a shortline railroad in Vermont and eastern New York, operating much of the former Rutland Railway. It is the main part of the Vermont Rail System, which also owns the Green Mountain Railroad, the Rutland's branch to Bellows Falls. The trackage is owned by the Vermont Agency of Transportation except in New York, where VTR operates a line owned by the Boston and Maine Corporation. The rail line employs about 150 people in Vermont.
Primary State Highway 6 (PSH 6) was a Washington state highway in the older primary and secondary system that existed from 1937 until 1964 in Spokane and Pend Oreille counties. The road ran from an intersection with PSH 3, U.S. Route 2 and US 395 in Spokane north to British Columbia Highway 6 (BC 6) at the Canada–US border near Metaline Falls, passing its branch route and two secondary routes.
State Route 211 (SR 211) is a Washington state highway located in Pend Oreille County. The 15.18-mile (24.43 km) long route that begins at an intersection with U.S. Route 2 (US 2) east of Diamond Lake. The highway extends north to end at SR 20 in Usk, a small community south of Cusick. The roadway serves as a bypass of Newport. The route originally was established as Secondary State Highway 6B (SSH 6B) in 1937. SSH 6B was later renumbered to SR 311 in 1964 during the highway renumbering. After SR 20 was extended east over SR 31, the highway was renumbered to SR 211.
The Idaho & Washington Northern Railroad was a shortline railroad that operated between McGuire's Idaho and Metaline Falls, WA. It was later purchased by the Milwaukee Road
