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The Monson Blog / Re: The Monson After Passenger Service
« on: April 15, 2012, 06:00:30 PM »
Is there documentation that the Monson ceased to be a common carrier after 1938? While not unhead-of this would be an unusual step for a railroad to take, as it was still interchanging traffic with the BAR and relinquishing common carriage would mean the loss of joint rates.
It was not unusual for short connecting railroads like the Monson to be reduced in their later years to carrying only the traffic of their owners, thereby becoming de facto private carriers while still remaining common carriers at law. George W. Hilton called these roads nominal common carriers.
A rather extreme example would be the Sumpter Valley Railway in Oregon which abandoned its 60-mile mainline in 1947 but retained 1.5 miles of dual-gauge switching trackage to connect a large mill of the Oregon Lumber Co. (which owned the railroad) with the Union Pacific. This tiny remnant lasted until 1961, switching standard gauge cars into the mill with a narrow gauge locomotive, and remained a common carrier at law. The reason, of course, was that by travelling that 1.5 miles over SVRy track every carload entering or leaving the mill was elgible for origination or termination fees and joint rates with the Union Pacific or other roads it ran on.
It's obvious that the "common carrier at law" designation was not something that a railroad was eager to give up even though it had ceased to serve any general transport function. The Jones book lists a slate of officers during the Monson's final years, which indicates that it was still seperately incorporated. Along with the record of the company's petition to retain common carriage by truck after the railroad's final abandonment this suggests that the Monson probably remained a common carrier throughout its existance.
J
It was not unusual for short connecting railroads like the Monson to be reduced in their later years to carrying only the traffic of their owners, thereby becoming de facto private carriers while still remaining common carriers at law. George W. Hilton called these roads nominal common carriers.
A rather extreme example would be the Sumpter Valley Railway in Oregon which abandoned its 60-mile mainline in 1947 but retained 1.5 miles of dual-gauge switching trackage to connect a large mill of the Oregon Lumber Co. (which owned the railroad) with the Union Pacific. This tiny remnant lasted until 1961, switching standard gauge cars into the mill with a narrow gauge locomotive, and remained a common carrier at law. The reason, of course, was that by travelling that 1.5 miles over SVRy track every carload entering or leaving the mill was elgible for origination or termination fees and joint rates with the Union Pacific or other roads it ran on.
It's obvious that the "common carrier at law" designation was not something that a railroad was eager to give up even though it had ceased to serve any general transport function. The Jones book lists a slate of officers during the Monson's final years, which indicates that it was still seperately incorporated. Along with the record of the company's petition to retain common carriage by truck after the railroad's final abandonment this suggests that the Monson probably remained a common carrier throughout its existance.
J