Five days a week, Portland & Western Railroad hauls aggregate materials by rail for the construction giant Knife River Corporation.
Loaded at the Salem sand & gravel facility, this train then ships the rock and sand to two different quarries further north on the P&W system, with Knife River's Coffee Lake Quarry in Tonquin being the most common unloading destination. After an unloading process that usually takes a few hours, the train turns around and heads back to Brooks empty.
Using the P&Ws Oregon Electric mainline, formerly belonging to the Burlington Northern and later BNSF, the rock train traverses farmland and small towns, rolling through Western Oregon's quiet countryside that lies between Portland and Salem.
I shot this video on two separate occasions in July 2023, and at the time, the P&W had a pretty interesting locomotive consist assigned to the rock train. PNWR 3004 was the lead unit on the Northbound runs, previously belonging to the Saint Lawrence & Atlantic railroad, still wearing the black and yellow paint scheme.
Behind the 3004 is the 1854, an SD9 once serving the mighty Southern Pacific before it's life on the P&W. At the time I wrote this, the 1854 is the last operating Cadillac style EMD locomotive on the Portland & Western system, with the other GP and SD variants being sold off or scrapped entirely.
And finally, PNWR 2304 is one of the railroad's former Santa Fe GP39-2s, serving DPU duty when the train runs loaded, and is the Radio Controlled (RCL) locomotive in the train's consist, allowing the one-man train crew to operate the train when he is outside the cab performing other job duties.
Being totally new to this operation as well as unfamiliar with the territory and way the P&W does things, shooting this train two times in the middle of July was nothing short of a adventure. I learned so much about the OE District line such as it's history, operating style, and usual trains. I also became familiar and even comfortable with a beautiful piece of Oregon that was previously uncharted territory for me, diving into each little town's history and it's relation to the railroad. Hell, I even spent the night in Donald.
Along with the rock train, views of Mt Jefferson at sunrise, vintage semi trucks, and even an encounter with the Salem switcher local freight as it takes the OE Main in front of the rock train are also included for your viewing pleasure.
And of course, recorded on Vinyl using two different recording methods mixed together into one track, is Chuck Mangione's "I've Never Missed Someone Before", off a first-run pressing of his album "Fun and Games". I always try and feature music and artists that fit with and accentuate the vibe of the video production. Thank you to Hi-Voltage records in Tacoma for making this happen!
Shooting and piecing together this video was an awesome experience for me, and I hope you enjoy it, too. This won't be the last of the Portland & Western you'll see on SSRM!
Timestamps:
0:00 Video Introduction
0:20 Sunrise in the countryside
1:20 Title screen
1:58 Departure from Salem sand & gravel
3:42 Stopping for the switch at River Road
5:30 Waconda roll-by
6:19 Hillsboro-Silverton Highway Highball
7:49 Track speed through Donald
9:13 Unloading at the Coffee Lake Quarry (Tonquin)
10:16 Southbound Salem Switcher at Donald
12:06 Picking up speed at Main Street (Donald)
14:24 Wheat fields, old school trains & trucks
16:16 Rolling into Brooks
18:17 Ending the day with wildflowers
19:55 Video end screen
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