| By: | Andre Wehrle |
| Dates: | 8/21/2006 - 5/24/2024 |
| Album Info: | This former Milwaukee Road line was one of several radiating out of the Capital City to be put up for abandonment by the bankrupt carrier in the 1980s, despite the fact that it connected south-central Wisconsin's two largest cities. Along with several of the others, it was rescued by the state DOT and the multi-county Wisconsin River Rail Transit Commission and operated by short line Wisconsin & Calumet until WICT's takeover by the Wisconsin & Southern Railroad, which today operates the line as the Madison Subdivision. It serves as the main line of the WSOR's Southern Division, ferrying traffic north from Janesville bound for points on the branch lines out of Madison, and bringing traffic back from the branches and the Canadian Pacific's line from Portage to Janesville and the outside world. There is also considerable on-line traffic generated in the communities of McFarland, Stoughton, Edgerton, and Milton Junction. Union Pacific ballast trains to and from the quarry at Rock Springs on the Reedsburg line operated in the summers until 2011.
The line was upgraded to continuous welded rail in 2010-11 after two major derailments in 2007 contributed to its being slow-ordered to 10 MPH. |
