Western Railroad Discussion > What to see in Hartford, SD? (Sioux Falls area)

I may be heading to Hartford, SD (Sioux Falls area) in the next week for a quick visit, is there anything worth seeing in the area? I would love to see any remnants of the Milwaukee Road and short line stuff but any and all trains will work.

Kris

Kris,
It's been a while since I've visited Sioux Falls but there were a variety of things to see. The Ellis & Eastern is on the west end of town. There's a quarry there and they were parking their GP and SW either inside or outside the building. This is near the fair grounds, I believe. It's very close to I-29...on the east side of the interstate.

There is the BNSF right in the middle of town. Not great access.

If you follow the BNSF tracks northeast out of town, you'll get to Brandon (right on I-90). Head north on 11 from there and you'll see the freight car rebuild facility at Corson. If you are lucky to see a train out that way, you can chase northward to Garretson where it meets another line.
Here's a map: http://goo.gl/maps/l1aT9

If you have more time, go to my favorite location, Dell Rapids to see the Dakota & Iowa.
http://goo.gl/maps/ZWvBF

I've posted a variety of photos on my website: http://www.shastarails.com/photos/location.asp

http://www.shastarails.com/photos/pbl.asp?location=Brandon,%20SD
http://www.shastarails.com/photos/pbl.asp?location=Dell%20Rapids,%20SD
http://www.shastarails.com/photos/pbl.asp?location=Sioux%20Falls,%20SD

Hope this helps!

Ryan Wilkerson
Fair Oaks, CA

Here are a few TO links from a quick search, I'm sure there are more:
http://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?1,2924911,2925050#2925050
http://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?1,2457430,2458355#2458355
http://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?1,1711664,1712125#1712125

Ryan Wilkerson
Fair Oaks, CA

If my experience from a couple of years ago is valid, there should be a morning southbound on the D&I on Monday and Wednesday morning. Of course, that was in August, not December, so the stone-quarry traffic could be down for the cold season. The ethanol plant north of Hawarden, Iowa, should still be busy, though.

D&I was running the southbound loaded rock train in the morning. I believe they were leaving from Dell Rapids in the early morning and running through to Sioux City. They would be passing over the bridge right above Sioux Falls inthe early morning. The empty rock train then leaves Sioux City in the early afternoon for the northbound run. It didn't get back to Sioux Falls till really late at night.

This was the usual operating pattern as of last last spring.

Posted from iPhone

Pretty similar now, last Monday the NB went through North Sioux just after noon and had both ethanol empties
and corn plus some rock cars.

Just east of downtown along the river, the BNSF (ex GN), D&I (ex MILW) and the E&E all cross.
Go there in the AM. The E&E, if they are running, runs in the morning. Sounds like the D&I in running in the AM too.
The BNSF has an office there in one end of the old GN offices, which is a large building you can't miss.
There can be up to 8 GP's there for runs to the north, east and to Mitchell, SD, plus there used to be an SW1500 and GN caboose there for the local switching near town

Both the BNSF and the D&I use all the tracks to the north, it's kind of a mess of tracks until you get North of town a few blocks...then the D&I goes NW up along the east side of the FSD airport, and the BN goes NE.

To the south, the bridge in view is the E&E, the next line to the right is probably the remnants of a once longer line..it now goes to a few miles south for some industries and that's it. The line going SE is the BNSF to Canton and Mitchell. The D&I has trackage rights on this line south to Canton, where they join their own tracks again.

In this Google earth shot from 2010, there are 3 BNSF GP-38's there (2 BN paint and 1 SF paint) The GN caboose is on the track across from the engines.



Edited 4 time(s). Last edit at 12/08/12 13:02 by pdt.

---

And the city of Sioux Falls wants all this dirty, noisy BNSF track torn out so they can develop all this area.

Another fine political money grab. You'd think it was New Jersey.

It looks like they might be working on eliminating the "yard" that is northwest of the GN station.
The D&I trains used to use this track, but now they cross over the GN "connecting" track, and use the
ex-GN line down to the station, and the connector at the SE edge of the track complex below the GN station.
This yard looks like it was the GB/MILW interchange yard in FSD many years ago.
D&I may have used it for empties once upon a time, but I've never seen anything there xcpt for a few M/W cars.

rehunn Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Pretty similar now, last Monday the NB went
> through North Sioux just after noon and had both
> ethanol empties
> and corn plus some rock cars.


Be careful here, I think this ^^^ refers to Sioux City, IA/North Sioux City, SD, which is a ways farther south.