The Copper Basin Railway is an

Arizona Arizona is a U.S. state, state in the Southwestern United States, Southwestern region of the United States, sharing the Four Corners region of the western United States with Colorado, New Mexico, and Utah. It also borders Nevada to the nort ...

short-line railroad A shortline railroad is a small or mid-sized railroad company that operates over a relatively short distance relative to larger, national railroad networks. The term is used primarily in the United States and Canada. In the former, railroads are ...

that operates from a connection with the

Union Pacific Railroad The Union Pacific Railroad is a Railroad classes, Class I freight-hauling railroad that operates 8,300 locomotives over routes in 23 U.S. states west of Chicago and New Orleans. Union Pacific is the second largest railroad in the United Stat ...

(UP) at Magma to Winkelman, in of length. The railroad also has a branch line that runs from Ray Junction to

Ray, Arizona Ray is a ghost town in Pinal County, Arizona, United States; it is mostly known for the large copper mine there. It was named after the nearby Ray mine, which was begun by the Ray Copper Company in 1882, after the sister of one of the miners, w ...

. There was formerly an interchange with the San Manuel Arizona Railroad (SMA) at

Hayden Hayden may refer to: Places Inhabited places in the United States * Hayden, Alabama *Hayden, Arizona *Hayden's Ferry, former name of Tempe, Arizona *Hayden, California, former name of Hayden Hill, California *Hayden, Colorado *Hayden, Idaho *Hayde ...

. The CBRY exists primarily to serve a

copper mine Copper extraction is the multi-stage process of obtaining copper from its ores. The conversion of copper ores consists of a series of physical, chemical, and electrochemical processes. Methods have evolved and vary with country depending on the ...

L. S. “Jake” Jacobson Lowell S. "Jake" Jacobson (1940-2021) served 29 years with the Union Pacific Railroad, later president and chief operating officer of the Copper Basin Railway The Copper Basin Railway is an List of Arizona railroads, Arizona short-line railroad ...

was the President and Chief Operating Officer, retiring in 2020 after more than 30 years in his position. In summer 2006,

ASARCO ASARCO (American Smelting and Refining Company) is a mining, smelting, and refining company based in Tucson, Arizona, which mines and processes primarily copper. The company has been a subsidiary of Grupo México since 1999. Its three largest ...

Copper Corporation purchased the entire railroad.

Traffic

107,000 cars per year (1996 estimate) *

copper Copper is a chemical element; it has symbol Cu (from Latin ) and atomic number 29. It is a soft, malleable, and ductile metal with very high thermal and electrical conductivity. A freshly exposed surface of pure copper has a pinkish-orang ...

concentrates *

ore Ore is natural rock or sediment that contains one or more valuable minerals, typically including metals, concentrated above background levels, and that is economically viable to mine and process. The grade of ore refers to the concentration ...

* finished and unfinished copper *

sulfuric acid Sulfuric acid (American spelling and the preferred IUPAC name) or sulphuric acid (English in the Commonwealth of Nations, Commonwealth spelling), known in antiquity as oil of vitriol, is a mineral acid composed of the elements sulfur, oxygen, ...

lumber Lumber is wood that has been processed into uniform and useful sizes (dimensional lumber), including beams and planks or boards. Lumber is mainly used for construction framing, as well as finishing (floors, wall panels, window frames). ...

military equipment A military, also known collectively as armed forces, is a heavily armed, highly organized force primarily intended for warfare. Militaries are typically authorized and maintained by a sovereign state, with their members identifiable by a d ...

gypsum Gypsum is a soft sulfate mineral composed of calcium sulfate Hydrate, dihydrate, with the chemical formula . It is widely mined and is used as a fertilizer and as the main constituent in many forms of plaster, drywall and blackboard or sidewalk ...

History

Magma–Winkelman line

The Magma–Winkelman line was constructed by the

Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway The Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway , often referred to as the Santa Fe or AT&SF, was one of the largest Class 1 railroads in the United States between 1859 and 1996. The Santa Fe was a pioneer in intermodal freight transport; at vario ...

(ATSF) subsidiary Phoenix and Eastern Railroad between 1902 - 1904. The Phoenix and Eastern Railroad built the railroad from Phoenix –Winkelman via

Florence Florence ( ; ) is the capital city of the Italy, Italian region of Tuscany. It is also the most populated city in Tuscany, with 362,353 inhabitants, and 989,460 in Metropolitan City of Florence, its metropolitan province as of 2025. Florence ...

. It originally proposed to build to a connection with the

Southern Pacific Railroad The Southern Pacific (or Espee from the railroad initials) was an American Railroad classes#Class I, Class I Rail transport, railroad network that existed from 1865 to 1996 and operated largely in the Western United States. The system was oper ...

(SP) at Benson but the line was never built past Winkelman. * December 10, 1904 - the railroad was leased to Santa Fe upon completion of construction and was operated by ATSF subsidiary

Santa Fe, Prescott and Phoenix Railway The Santa Fe, Prescott and Phoenix Railway (SFP&P) was a common carrier railroad that later became an operating subsidiary of the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway in Arizona. At Ash Fork, Arizona, the SFP&P connected with Santa Fe's opera ...

. * March 13, 1907 - the Phoenix & Eastern became an

operating subsidiary An operating subsidiary is a subsidiary of a corporation through which the parent company (which may or may not be a holding company) indirectly conducts some portion of its business. Usually, an operating subsidiary can be distinguished in that ...

of SP. * March 10, 1910 - the Phoenix & Eastern was leased and became a non-operating subsidiary of SP and operated by the

Arizona Eastern Railroad The Arizona Eastern Railway is a Class III railroad that operates of railroad between Clifton, Arizona, and Miami, Arizona, in the United States. This includes trackage rights over the Union Pacific Railroad between Lordsburg, New Mexico, and ...

. * 1911 - the track at Winkelman was extended to

Christmas, Arizona Christmas is an uninhabited mining community in Gila County, Arizona, United States. The mine which led to creation of the town was staked on Christmas Day 1902, prompting the name. During the three decades in which the town's post office oper ...

by the Arizona Eastern Railway. * October 31, 1945 - the railroad was sold to the Arizona Eastern Railroad. * September 30, 1955 - the Arizona Eastern Railroad was merged into SP. * 1961 - the track from Winkelman to

was abandoned by SP. * At some point SP sold the line to mine operator

Kennecott Copper Kennecott Utah Copper LLC (KUC), a division of Rio Tinto Group, is a mining, smelting, and refining company. Its corporate headquarters are located in South Jordan, Utah. Kennecott operates the Bingham Canyon Mine, one of the largest open-pit c ...

. * August 15, 1986 - the line was sold by Kennecott Copper and the CBRY was started. * 1986–2005 - the CBRY was owned by

Rail Management Corporation Durden Enterprises II Inc - Formally Rail Management Corporation (RMC), based in Panama City Beach, Florida, was a holding company of short line railroads in the southeastern United States. History On May 26, 2005, Genesee and Wyoming (G&W) ...

. * 2006 (summer) - ASARCO Copper Corporation purchased the entire railroad. ASARCO also owns the Ray Mine and Hayden Smelter, CBRY's primary customers. This railway served as the backdrop to

Dwight Yoakam Dwight David Yoakam (born October 23, 1956) is an American singer-songwriter, actor, and filmmaker. He first achieved mainstream attention in 1986 with the release of his debut album ''Guitars, Cadillacs, Etc., Etc.''. Yoakam had considerable s ...

’s “ A Thousand Miles from Nowhere” music video. He is seen near the tracks and moving about a train throughout the video.

Route

The route primarily follows the

Gila River The Gila River (; O'odham ima Keli Akimel or simply Akimel, Quechan: Haa Siʼil, Maricopa language: Xiil) is a tributary of the Colorado River flowing through New Mexico and Arizona in the United States. The river drains an arid watershed of ...

. * Magma (Webster) – UP/MAA * Florence Junction * Florence * Stanco * Barr * Munn (Alta) * Price * Tunnel 1 (over in length, second in Arizona only to the tunnel on the

Arizona Central Railroad The Clarkdale Arizona Central Railroad is an Arizona short-line railroad that operates from a connection with the BNSF Railway's Phoenix Subdivision at Drake, Arizona. The Drake Switching Company also operates a connection between the BNSF and ...

). * Cochran * North across the Gila River can be seen the Coke Ovens, several "beehive" kilns. Made from rock, they were originally built to make coke out of local timber and copper/silver ore. * Butte * Zellweger * Wooley * Ray Junction * Tunnel 2 * Riverside * Erman * Tunnel 3 * Kearny * Branaman * Burns * Hayden Junction. Location of the operational center for the SP until the system was rebuilt to have ore trains go directly from Ray to Hayden for unloading onto a new conveyor system. * Hayden (office) ** Spur to Kennecott Copper (KCCX) Mill and Smelter * KCCX Ore Unload * San Manuel Arizona Railroad Junction (to San Manuel and Mammoth Mine) * Winkelman

References

* * *

External links