Rainier Rail Over ex-Tacoma Rail

[@thesoundoftransit]

It’s nice to see the tracks were at-least seeing some sort of use. Just wish mainline freight could run down that line again, that would be a dream.

[@MarcelosalivaTRENESArg]

Muy buen video Excelente estimado amigo 😊increíble 😮y un saludo 👋🏻

[@DSZI.ShyHunterBB]

I sincerely hope they run all the way back down to 72nd street crossing again. Always dreamed I’d see a train cross there and even tried to catch the elusive hill job back when it ran to find out that I missed it by a couple hours😅

[@AtTheCrossingProductions]

Agreed, I sure do miss the Tacoma Rail trains through 72nd. Hopefully Rainier will get some contracts out of Tacoma someday

[@chuxtuff]

@@AtTheCrossingProductions I worked for the City of Tacoma Street Dept and we did a lot of the maintenance on those tracks clear out to Morton clearing away brush, down trees and keeping the line in running condition especially after storms. I've been in a high railer truck ON THE RAILS from downtown Tacoma, through South Tacoma, Midland, Graham all the way to Morton and if you keep left leaving Elbe you'll go instead to National near the Nat'l park entrance. The City of Tacoma owned all of those tracks at that time so their street dept did all of that maintenance. There was a mill at the end of the line in Morton that Home Depot operated so at one time there was those folks with train cars of forest products and then in Eatonville at Randles pit they'd get train car loads of aggregate, dirt and other rock products. In the old days I remember that there was a logging train that left South Tacoma early & empty every day. Went to Mineral and dropped the 80 empty log cars they brought with them into Murray Pacific's yard there and then hooked up to the string of 80 that were loaded and ready to be brought in to Tacoma and were by late after noon ALMOST EVERY DAY FOR DECADES. Remember the Milwaukee Road orange and black logging trains coming back through South Tacoma loaded up fully with logs until the early 1980's??? That's where those logs came from - Murray Pacific's log yard in Mineral Washington.

[@Cyfi71]

One man remote crew?

[@kennethboucher7663]

Nobody in the industry calls a flatcar a flatbed. That’s a truck trailer.

[@anonymouspepper2012]

Great video! That track does NOT sound good! Besides the track cleanup, has any work on this route been done whatsoever since they acquired the line? Also, unless you cut it out, it's impressive you managed to film RNIR without getting yelled at

[@AtTheCrossingProductions]

Only work they’ve done since is put up concrete blocks, track is in bad shape. That being said the track was like that on TR as well. The conductor did talk to us at one point, but he was actually pretty chill

[@chuxtuff]

It's not the trackage that's really valuable here. It's the right of way that's the real value they want to preserve. And in 5 or 10 years into the future they'll be running transit trains with trails for bikes and walkers off to one side as growth goes to in that direction. The City of Tacoma owns the tracks that go through south Tacoma (which is what this video shows) on out to Graham then to Elbe where they can either go to National and Mt Rainier or go over the bridge in Elbe heading towards Morton. They own the tracks clear out near Yelm (called Western Junction) and into south Tacoma via the Fort Lewis routes as well. Again it's not the tracks that're the valuable asset here as much as it's the Rights of Way that are these routes.