Idaho Northern and Pacific Railroad
The Idaho Northern and Pacific Railroad (reporting mark INPR) is a small railroad that runs in Southwest Idaho and Eastern Oregon in the United States. It operates about 210 miles of former Union Pacific branch lines and is currently a subsidiary of the Rio Grande Pacific Company. As of 2006, the INPR operates three separate sections of rail, one running from La Grande, Oregon to Elgin, Oregon, connecting at Elgin with another former UP rail line now owned by Wallowa County which continues to Joseph, Oregon,and the other section is one of the most scenic stretches of Union Pacific route, running from Payette through Emmett and then into the Canyon of the Payette River on a northerly route to Cascade. This line historically continued on to the former logging community McCall.
From 1998 until 2015, the INPR operated the Thunder Mountain Line, a tourist railroad between Horseshoe Bend and Cascade.[1] The Thunder Mountain Line offered scenic tours, dinner trains and "river and rail" trips in the Payette Canyon that allowed riders to ride a train in one direction and return by river raft on the water of the North Fork of the Payette River.[2] Both the Oregon portion and the Payette River line were historically built as logging and lumbering lines with large Boise Cascade mills located in nearby communities, but some of those mills were disbanded and closed in recent times, consistent with a decline in logging and lumber processing in much of the Northwestern United States . As of 2012 The Idaho Northern and Pacific serves the still operating Boise Cascade lumber and plywood mills in Elgin, Oregon, the Boise Cascade particleboard plant in Island City, Oregon, and the Boise Cascade sawmill in La Grande, Oregon.
The Boise line was operated for freight connection with Union Pacific at Nampa and to serve the industrial areas in East Boise with rail service, until the Boise Valley Railroad took over operations in 2009, possibly as a result of the economic downturn at the time.
Idaho Northern and Pacific's offices are located in Emmett.
References
- ↑ "Thunder Mountain Line closes down". KBOI. KBOI. Retrieved 20 January 2016.
- ↑ "Idaho, Northern And Pacific Railroad". American-Rails.com. Retrieved 20 January 2016.
- Ehernberger, James L. And Francis G. Gschwind. Smoke Down the Canyons, Union Pacific Idaho Division. (1966)
External links
- Thunder Mountain Line tourist train history page
- INPR information from Rio Grande Pacific Corporation
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