Review by Ed Quillen
Transportation – August 2001 – Colorado Central Magazine
Tribute to Tennessee Pass
110-minute video
Published in 1997 by Pentrex
P.O. Box 94911, Pasadena CA 91109
www.pentrex.com
No ISBN
THE RUSTING RAILROAD TRACKS along the upper Arkansas River are generally silent these days, but they were a busy place in 1997, their last summer of full mainline operation.
Up to 20 trains a day traversed the line then. Westbound freights were assembled in Pueblo, then rolled up the river to Canon City, Salida, Malta (the railroad junction west of Leadville), and the Continental Divide at a tunnel under Tennessee Pass — the highest through route in the United States.
On the west side of the pass, from the tunnel apex to Minturn, the steep 3% grade (elevation changing three feet for every 100 feet of travel) made for a challenge either way. Westbound trains going downhill needed additional braking power, lest they get out of control, and eastbound trains headed up that grade needed additional locomotives — helper engines — to reach the top.
From Minturn, the tracks proceeded down the Eagle River to its junction with the Colorado River at Dotsero. That was also the Tennessee Pass line’s junction with the Moffat Tunnel Route that runs west from Denver.
That’s the setting, and this video provides an extensive view of a variety of freight trains operating along the route during the summer of 1997. Both the sound (plenty of clickety-clack and squeaking flanges) and visual quality are first-rate, and the narration provides a clear explanation of what we’re seeing.
This video is designed for hard-core railroad buffs, rather than history buffs. Its focus is on operations in 1997, rather than anything that came before.
For instance, it gives lots of details about the locomotives in use, but it doesn’t mention the nearby Midland Tunnels, or the Colorado Midland Railroad, when there’s a train passing Elephant Rock north of Buena Vista.
And if you’re looking for views from the locomotive cab, or from vantages not reached by road (i.e., Royal Gorge, Brown’s Canyon, Tennessee River gorge), you’ll need to look elsewhere. The people who shot this video didn’t have any special access.
That said, it still provides some informative scenes, like four swing helpers being inserted into a long eastbound train at Minturn — an event that may have been a frequent noisy disruption to that town’s residents, but something I’d always wanted to see.
Much of the rest was familiar, but on the other hand, so was Marshall Pass when the narrow-gauge was running, and so was the Monarch Quarry Line 20 years ago — and now I’d sure like to see similar videos of their operations. So this video, even if most of its contents are vivid in many local memories, will doubtless become an important documentary in the future, especially if the rails are ever removed from the line.
— Ed Quillen