The East Tennessee Railway, L.P. is a

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 ...

connecting

CSX Transportation CSX Transportation , known colloquially as simply CSX, is a Class I freight railroad company operating in the Eastern United States and the Canadian provinces of Ontario and Quebec. Operating about 21,000 route miles () of track, it is the lead ...

and the

Norfolk Southern Railway The Norfolk Southern Railway is a Class I freight railroad operating in the Eastern United States. Headquartered in Atlanta, the company was formed in 1982 with the merger of the Norfolk and Western Railway and Southern Railway. The comp ...

Johnson City, Tennessee Johnson City is a city in Washington, Carter, and Sullivan counties in the U.S. state of Tennessee, mostly in Washington County. As of the 2020 United States census, the population was 71,046, making it Tennessee's eighth-most populous cit ...

. Since 2005, the railroad has been owned by

Genesee and Wyoming Genesee & Wyoming Inc. (G&W) is an American short line railroad holding company, that owns or maintains an interest in 122 railroads in the United States, Canada, Belgium, Netherlands, Poland, and the United Kingdom; and formerly in Australia. ...

, an international operator of short line railroads, as part of its Rail Link group. The railroad uses a single

diesel locomotive A diesel locomotive is a type of railway locomotive in which the prime mover (locomotive), power source is a diesel engine. Several types of diesel locomotives have been developed, differing mainly in the means by which mechanical power is con ...

, SW1200 #214, to serve a small number of industries and a

transloading Transloading, also known as cross-docking, is the process of transferring a shipment from one mode of transportation to another. It is most commonly employed when one mode cannot be used for the entire trip, such as when goods must be shipped in ...

facility, as well as to provide interchange services between NS and CSX. East Tennessee Railway Switching Omni Scrapyard Johnson City TN

Flagging Alabama Street as East Tennessee Railway Shoves West in Johnson City TN

The current standard gauge railroad is a remnant of a larger,

narrow gauge A narrow-gauge railway (narrow-gauge railroad in the US) is a railway with a track gauge (distance between the rails) narrower than . Most narrow-gauge railways are between and . Since narrow-gauge railways are usually built with Minimum railw ...

railroad, the

East Tennessee and Western North Carolina Railroad The East Tennessee & Western North Carolina Railroad , affectionately called the "Tweetsie" as a verbal acronym of its initials (ET&WNC) but also in reference to the sound of its steam whistles, was a primarily narrow gauge railroad established ...

, chartered in 1866 to haul iron ore from

Cranberry, North Carolina Cranberry is an unincorporated community, North Carolina, unincorporated community in Avery County, North Carolina, Avery County, North Carolina, United States. The community was founded in 1850 and was named after Cranberry Creek, which flows in ...

to Johnson City across the

Appalachian Mountains The Appalachian Mountains, often called the Appalachians, are a mountain range in eastern to northeastern North America. The term "Appalachian" refers to several different regions associated with the mountain range, and its surrounding terrain ...

. Through an acquisition and track extensions, the railroad grew to serve

Boone, North Carolina Boone is a town in and the county seat of Watauga County, North Carolina, United States. Located in the Blue Ridge Mountains of western North Carolina, Boone is the home of Appalachian State University and the headquarters of the disaster and me ...

and Saginaw, North Carolina. ET&WNC used

dual gauge Dual gauge railroad track has three or four rails, allowing vehicles of two track gauges to run on it. Signalling and sidings are more expensive to install on dual gauge tracks than on two single gauge tracks. Dual gauge is used when there i ...

tracks between Johnson City and Elizabethton; eventually the railroad ceased all narrow gauge operations and only operated standard gauge service on this one section. Later, with a change in ownership this limited line was reorganized as the East Tennessee Railway. In 2003, the last train left Elizabethton, TN and in 2009 the line was formally abandoned and

railbank Railbanking is the practice of preserving Rail transport, rail Right-of-way (property access), corridors for possible future use. Railbanking leaves the railroad, railbed, bridges or bridge corridor, and other infrastructure intact. This relieves ...

ed. The rails and ties were removed in 2012 to make way for a

rail-trail A rail trail or railway walk is a shared-use path on a railway right of way. Rail trails are typically constructed after a railway has been abandoned and the track has been removed but may also share the rail corridor with active railways, li ...

. The East Tennessee Railway still services customers around the yard in Johnson City and still makes deliveries to the CSXT and NS. ETRY started out with a two-man crew for many years, and have just now upped to a three-man crew. Operations are Monday through Friday. It can hold up to 286,000 pounds of supplies.

References

External links

East Tennessee Railway official webpage - Genesee and Wyoming websiteTennessee Shortline Railroad Directory

Tennessee railroads Genesee & Wyoming {{Tennessee-transport-stub

See also

References

External links