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A Railroad Not to Be - The Hayfield Northern
By Jerry Huddleston
One minute past midnight on July 1, 1968,
the Chicago Great Western ceased to exist as an autonomous railroad.
Hayfield, Minnesota had been an important junction for the CGW;
however, under new Chicago & North Western management, its
status was quickly downgraded. In 1981 the C&NW filed an
application with the Interstate Commerce Commission seeking permission
to abandon the Hayfield line between Oelwein, Iowa and Randolph,
Minnesota, a total of 146 miles. In opposition, a year later,
a group of shippers formed the Hayfield Northern Railroad Co.
to preserve rail service for the Minnesota communities of Hayfield,
Waltham, and Sargeant. The once busy CGW junction of Hayfield
would then have to take its case to the United States Supreme
Court to try and retain rail service.
In the year before the merger, Hayfield was
located on the busiest section of CGW trackage and was host to
several long daily freights. The CGW had stationed two Alco's
at the two-stall engine facility in Hayfield. The Alco's were
mostly used for the Hormel turn to Austin, Minnesota about 17
miles south of Hayfield. Many of the F-units that frequented
the line were also serviced at Hayfield. Refers from Hormel in
Austin were sent north to Hayfield, and from there coupled on
trains headed for Chicago or Kansas City, via Oelwein. The last
passenger train rolled north through Hayfield on September 30,
1965.
In the year after the merger, the C&NW
dramatically reduced train movements on the Hayfield line. The
C&NW had said from the beginning of the merger negotiations
that they had only wanted the Kansas City extension of the CGW
and that the rest of the system was viewed as expendable. Their
actions were fully consistent with that belief. The first merger
economy was realized when track from Waltham to Austin was taken
out of service and the Austin job was handled from the south,
at Mason City, Iowa. In Illinois, track was taken out of service
from Aiken to Byron. The C&NW main ran barely thirty miles
to the south and this track elimination was considered another
merger economy. As a result, the Hayfield line now saw only Twin
Cities to Kansas City freight - the Chicago and Omaha traffic
was eliminated entirely from the line.
The Hayfield line became part of the C&NW
Missouri Division. The Missouri Division gained notoriety as
a rolling museum for former CGW F-units and second hand F-units
which the C&NW had purchased in the early 1970s and had rebuilt
at the Oelwein System Shop.
The Hayfield line was one of two C&NW
north-south secondary main lines in Minnesota, the former Minneapolis
& St. Louis line being the other. Neither of these two lines
had heavy through traffic and being strapped with the maintenance
costs associated with both lines, the C&NW chose to give
the Louie line priority resulting in a steady decline in the
physical condition of the Hayfield line. Maintenance was done
only when absolutely required. The Hayfield line was still useful
to the C&NW to haul grain to Kansas City, as long as the
track conditions would permit, but the Hayfield line was soon
ground to pieces under the weight of heavy grain trains. By 1981
the track condition had deteriorated so badly that track speed
on many portions of the line was only 10 mph, causing operational
costs for the C&NW to skyrocket.
The facilities on the Hayfield line fared
even worse than the maintenance program for the track. By 1972,
New Hampton, Iowa was the only train order station left open
between Dodge Center, Minnesota, and Oelwein. The Dodge Center
depot was one of the sheet metal stations built during CGW's
modernization program in the 1950s. The Dodge Center depot remains
today and is currently used by the Dakota, Minnesota, and Eastern
for storage. The Hayfield depot was sold to a private party a
few years after the merger, and subsequently demolished. The
Sargeant and Waltham depots were also demolished. The two-stall
engine facility at Hayfield built in 1961 survived and was sold
to Century Plastics in 1971. Century Plastics made several additions
to the structure so that it could be utilized as a factory.
The death knell was sounded for the Hayfield
line in March of 1980 when the Interstate Commerce Commission
authorized interim operations over portions of the bankrupt Rock
Island. The C&NW began leasing the former Rock Island property
between the Twin Cities and Kansas City along with associated
grain branch lines, a total of 720 miles. This route was shorter
and better engineered than the former CGW route between the same
two cities and was later purchased by the C&NW in June 1983
for 93 million dollars. The fate of the Hayfield line was sealed.
On January 30, 1981 the C&NW filed an
application with the ICC seeking permission to abandon 146 miles
of track between Randolph and Oelwein. The C&NW maintained
that continued operation of the line imposed serious financial
strain on its resources. An administrative law judge conferred
and ruled that the C&NW was entitled to abandon the property.
A group of shippers then organized and opposed abandonment of
19.2 miles of track from Dodge Center to Hayfield, Waltham, and
Sargeant. The shippers group and the C&NW were unable to
come to terms as to the disposition of the trackage. Then in
accordance with the Staggers Rail Act of 1980, the ICC calculated
that the shippers group could retain rail service for a $300,000
annual subsidy, or purchase the line outright for 1.8 million
dollars. The shippers group was dissatisfied with the ICC decision
and was forced to withdraw its offer. Soon thereafter on May
20, 1981 the ICC granted a certificate of abandonment. The last
revenue train traveled the 146 miles between Oelwein and Randolph
on November 6, 1981.
On March 31, 1982, members of the shippers
group formed the Hayfield Northern Railroad Co. to attempt to
preserve rail service. The Hayfield Northern planned to use Minnesota
Statute 227.27 on eminent domain to condemn the 19.2 miles of
track. Their hope was to acquire the track for a more affordable
condemnation price (calculated by their appraiser to be between
$50,000 and $100,000), rather than the price of 1.8 million dollars
set by the ICC. The Hayfield Northern filed suit in a Minnesota
court and obtained a temporary restraining order on April 2,
1982 preventing the C&NW from tearing out the signals and
track. C&NW track removal crews were forced to begin the
1982 season at Sargeant, where they began removing track and
signals south towards Oelwein.
The C&NW immediately removed the suit
to a Federal District Court and moved to dissolve the restraining
order on the grounds that the Federal Staggers Rail Act of 1980
as amended, pre-empted the Minnesota condemnation statute 227.27.
As noted in the House of Representatives Conference Report No.
96-1430, "the abandonment provisions of the Staggers Rail
Act were to accomplish two major objectives: significantly reducing
the time spent processing abandonment cases for the ICC and improving
the process by which abandoned lines can be subsidized. It will
assist shippers who are sincerely interested in improving rail
service, while at the same time protect carriers from protracted
legal proceedings which are calculated merely to tediously extend
the abandonment process." In contrast to the complicated
structure of the Federal Act, the Minnesota condemnation Statute
227.27 is a more straightforward application of the states' rights
of eminent domain. Originally enacted in 1879 it provides "every
foreign and domestic railroad shall have the power to acquire,
by purchase or condemnation, all necessary roadways, spur and
side tracks, rights of way, depot grounds, yards, grounds for
gravel pits, machine shops, warehouses, elevators, depots, station
houses, and all other structures necessary or convenient for
the use, operation, or enjoyment of the road, and may make with
any other railroad company, such arrangements for the use of
any portion of its tracks and roadbeds as it may deem necessary."
The U. S. District Court for Minnesota Judge
Paul A. Magnuson entered a summary judgment in favor of the C&NW.
The Hayfield Northern was granted a stay pending appeal. The
Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit affirmed the District
Court judgment and dissolved the restraining order. Both courts
held that the Minnesota condemnation statute presented an obstacle
in the accomplishment of the purpose of the Federal Act.
The State of Minnesota then intervened in
the case on behalf of the Hayfield Northern and assisted them
in bringing their case to the Supreme Court. The state argued
that it was of absolute interest to the state that rail service
be continued to rural communities. Sixteen other states and the
U.S. solicitor general also backed the Hayfield Northern. The
case was argued February 21, 1984. On June 12, 1984 Justice Marshall
delivered the opinion of the court, "The Staggers Rail Act
of 1980, which amended the Interstate Commerce Act, regulates
the process by which rail carriers may abandon unprofitable lines
and provides a mechanism for shippers to obtain continued service
by purchasing lines or subsidizing their operations. This case
poses the question whether the Interstate Commerce Act, as amended,
preempts a Minnesota eminent domain statute used to condemn rail
property after it has been abandoned pursuant to the amendments.
The Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit held that the Act,
as amended, preempted the state statute. We disagree."
The Supreme Court sided 9-0 with the Hayfield
Northern in a remarkable unanimous vote and reversed the lower
courts decisions. The judgment set a new precedent by allowing
states' rights priority over Federal laws. The judgment will
assist many communities who attempt to preserve rail service
in their area in the future.
Unfortunately the decision was too late for
the Hayfield Northern. The C&NW had begun tearing up the
19.2 miles of track the Hayfield Northern had hoped to operate
back on March 24, 1983 after the appellate court ruled in favor
of the C&NW and had dissolved the restraining order. The
C&NW had removed the 115 lb. rail and used it to satisfy
contracts it had entered into with the State of Iowa and various
Iowa shippers. The Hayfield Northern shippers had spent about
$150,000 in legal costs and could not afford another court case
to get the C&NW to put the rails back in. Bill Reese of Reese
Farm Supply said that he contributed more than $25,000. "It
just reached a point of diminishing returns, we had spent too
much." Bill Howard was the former president of Power Span,
a factory that used to make 92-foot concrete utility poles in
Hayfield. "We contributed more than $60,000 because we had
the most to gain from renewed rail service. The additional cost
of trucking the poles to a railhead was $150 a pole." Power
Span shut down partially because there's no railroad on which
to ship the poles anymore. Steve Becvar of Century Plastics who
contributed over $20,000 summarized feelings, "We lost a
lot of money." Whatever the reason, the railroad is gone
and not likely ever to be rebuilt.
The author would like to thank Jennifer Johnston and Steve
Becvar for their help with this article. |
