(The following article by Karen Ogden was posted on the Great Falls Tribune website on July 20.)
MALTA, Mont. — A multimillion dollar railroad upgrade is turning motorists’ heads on the Hi-Line and putting cash in merchants’ pockets from Havre to Glasgow.
Some 250 railroaders are at work on the $13.5 million project from the Chinook area to Bowdoin just east of Malta.
With a fleet of heavy equipment and strong backs, they’re replacing 82,000 wooden ties and upgrading miles of rail along an 83-mile stretch of track.
The project, slated for completion July 26, is part of $54 million in track improvements planned in Montana this year, said Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railway spokesman Gus Melonas in Seattle.
The work includes a replacement project of 41,000 ties in the Stanford area that wrapped up six weeks ago.
In August crews will tackle the stretch of rail from Havre to Whitefish, working into early winter.
The overhaul is the largest railroad upgrade on the eastern Hi-Line in at least 25 years and a welcome boon for the local economy.
Every hotel room in Malta was full Tuesday. Restaurants, meanwhile, are filled with hungry workers at dinnertime.
“It’s been a very good deal,” said Lary Poulton whose bulk fuel company, Ezzie’s Wholesale Inc., is supplying diesel and oil for BNSF track equipment and locomotives.
“Their vehicles fueling up have been going to the local (gas) stations and that’s been a big boost for them, plus the snacks and the pop and the mosquito spray,” he added.
When the project is finished, residents also will enjoy smoother roads at railroad crossings, Melonas said. Wooden planks in crossings will be replaced with concrete from Dodson to roughly 12 miles east of Malta.
Workers descended on the area three weeks ago, including tie gangs, rail gangs, welders and high-tech crews with specialized equipment to create a smooth track surface.
In addition to replacing wooden ties, the crews are replacing 25 miles of old rail, capable of handling 115 pounds every three feet, with heavier gauge rail that can take 136 pounds every three feet.
Over 130 machines, many of them guided by computers, are doing the heavy lifting.
“However there are still occasions when our gandy dancers still have to swing the old spike maul,” Melonas said.
For the younger set, a quick bit of railroad trivia may be in order.
Gandy dancer is a name for railroad track workers, taken from old-time tools made by Chicago’s Gandy Manufacturing Co.
These days, the track work includes adjusting electronic rail sensors that warn engineers of defective bearings, shifted loads or dragging equipment.
“The crew used to sit in the caboose and they would watch the train,” Melonas said. “There are now computerized eyes on the side of the track that will detect any defects.”
The track improvements will allow trains to operate at maximum speed across the Hi-Line: 70 miles per hour for freight trains and 79 mph for Amtrak, Melonas said.
Trains currently lose roughly 20 minutes in Montana from traveling through “slow order” zones where poor track conditions require slower speeds.
Roughly 80 trains per day travel the Hi-Line, hauling passengers, grain, consumer goods, chemicals, automobiles and other loads back and forth between Chicago and northwest port cities.
“With the 80-plus trains that we run through Montana daily, and that includes local service as well as through trains, it’s critical to have an upgraded track program,” Melonas said. “…There’s always an anxious customer at the end of the line waiting for the cars’ safe and efficient arrival.”
To avoid interruptions during the Hi-Line project, work crews start before dawn and finish in time for afternoon Amtrak trains to pass through. Freight traffic also is running at full capacity but, as residents may have noticed, on a nighttime schedule.
Despite the late-night rumbling, the Malta community appreciates the activity, said Anne Boothe, director of the Malta-based Phillco economic development group.
“It’s been a very positive impact on our community, especially the motels are seeing the benefit and the taverns, restaurants, grocery stores, laundromats,” Boothe said. Malta often hosts railroad crews, “but not of this magnitude and not this length of stay,” Booth said.
Jeff and Lona Darrah, who took over Matt’s Alignment and Brake in Malta a month ago, are doing brake jobs, oil changes and other maintenance work on the railroad’s trucks.
“It has helped,” Jeff Darrah said. “It’ll be sad to see ’em leave.”
The Chinook Motor Inn, at the west end of the project, was booked full Tuesday with railroad workers, seismograph crews working on oil and gas projects and tourists.
“It’s affected our business big-time,” said owner Bob Sharples.
“The railroad crews are really nice people,” he added. “They don’t smoke in their non-smoking rooms and they’re gone by 5:30 in the morning.”