The Lynndyl Subdivision is a

rail line Rail or rails may refer to: Rail transport *Rail transport and related matters *Railway track or railway lines, the running surface of a railway Arts and media Film *Rails (film), ''Rails'' (film), a 1929 Italian film by Mario Camerini *Rail ( ...

owned and operated by 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) in the

U.S. state In the United States, a state is a constituent political entity, of which there are 50. Bound together in a political union, each state holds governmental jurisdiction over a separate and defined geographic territory where it shares its so ...

Utah Utah is a landlocked state in the Mountain states, Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It is one of the Four Corners states, sharing a border with Arizona, Colorado, and New Mexico. It also borders Wyoming to the northea ...

, running from

Salt Lake City Salt Lake City, often shortened to Salt Lake or SLC, is the capital and most populous city of the U.S. state of Utah. It is the county seat of Salt Lake County, the most populous county in the state. The city is the core of the Salt Lake Ci ...

southwest to Milford, where the Caliente Subdivision continues towards

Los Angeles Los Angeles, often referred to by its initials L.A., is the List of municipalities in California, most populous city in the U.S. state of California, and the commercial, Financial District, Los Angeles, financial, and Culture of Los Angeles, ...

. Effective February 1, 2000 (includes a list of subdivisions from the first post-merger timetable in 1998) It was formerly part of the

Los Angeles and Salt Lake Railroad The Los Angeles and Salt Lake Railroad was a rail company in California, Nevada, and Utah in the United States, that completed and operated a railway line between its namesake cities (Salt Lake City, Utah, and Los Angeles, California), via Las ...

and a section currently forms a segment of Union Pacific's Central Corridor. The subdivision is named for Lynndyl, a small community along the rail line. The highest elevation attained on the line is at Tintic. the line sees 16 trains daily between Lynndyl and Smelter (where the Shafter Subdivision splits to the west).

History

Mormon businessmen incorporated the Utah Southern Railroad in 1871 to build a

standard gauge A standard-gauge railway is a railway with a track gauge of . The standard gauge is also called Stephenson gauge (after George Stephenson), international gauge, UIC gauge, uniform gauge, normal gauge in Europe, and SGR in East Africa. It is the ...

line from Salt Lake City south to Payson. It was built by the construction company Grover, McCune & Read, a firm owned by Alfred W. McCune and two other Utah businessmen. It was completed to that city and beyond to

York York is a cathedral city in North Yorkshire, England, with Roman Britain, Roman origins, sited at the confluence of the rivers River Ouse, Yorkshire, Ouse and River Foss, Foss. It has many historic buildings and other structures, such as a Yor ...

(south of Santaquin) in 1875, and bought by the

later that year. The UP organized the Utah Southern Railroad Extension in 1879, and completed the line to Frisco in 1880. Both companies merged with the Utah Central Railroad (Salt Lake City- Ogden) to form the UP-controlled Utah Central Railway in 1881, and in 1889 it was merged with the

Utah and Northern Railway The Utah & Northern Railway is a defunct railroad that was operated in the Utah Territory and later in the Idaho Territory and Montana Territory in the western United States during the 1870s and 1880s. It was the first railroad in Idaho and in ...

and other companies to form the Oregon Short Line and Utah Northern Railway, which was reorganized as the

Oregon Short Line Railroad The Oregon Short Line Railroad was a railroad in Wyoming, Idaho, Utah, Montana and Oregon in the United States. The line was organized as the Oregon Short Line Railway in 1881 as a subsidiary of the Union Pacific Railway. The Union Pacific int ...

in 1897.Don Strack
UtahRails.net: Union Pacific in Utah, 1868-1899
accessed August 2008 The Salt Lake, Sevier Valley and Pioche Railroad was incorporated in 1872 to build west from Salt Lake City, and the Utah Western Railway, organized in 1874, acquired its unfinished roadbed and completed the

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 ...

line to a point near Stockton in 1877.Hilton, George W. ''American Narrow Gauge Railroads,'' pp. 536-7, Stanford University Press, Sanford, California, 1990. The company was reorganized in 1881 as the Utah and Nevada Railway, and the UP gained control later that year, merging it into the Oregon Short Line and Utah Northern Railway in 1889. The Oregon Short Line later converted the track to and extended the line south to the old Utah Southern at Lynndyl, west of Leamington. This new Leamington Cut-off, completed in 1903, had better

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s and alignment than the old route through Payson, which became a secondary route (and is now, where still in use, the Sharp Subdivision). The

San Pedro, Los Angeles and Salt Lake Railroad The Los Angeles and Salt Lake Railroad was a rail company in California, Nevada, and Utah in the United States, that completed and operated a railway line between its namesake cities (Salt Lake City, Utah, and Los Angeles, California), via Las ...

, half-owned by the OSL, bought the OSL's lines south and west of Salt Lake City later that year, and completed the line to Los Angeles in 1905. The short piece of the old line from Milford, where the new Los Angeles line left, west to Frisco became the Frisco Branch, and was abandoned in 1943. After the UP bought the

Western Pacific Railroad The Western Pacific Railroad was a Class I railroad in the United States. It was formed in 1903 as an attempt to break the near-monopoly the Southern Pacific Railroad had on rail service into northern California. WP's Feather River Route dire ...

in 1983, the two parallel lines between Salt Lake City and

Garfield ''Garfield'' is an American comic strip created by Jim Davis (cartoonist), Jim Davis. Originally published locally as ''Jon'' in 1976 (later changed to ''Garfield'' in 1977), then in nationwide Print syndication, syndication from 1978, it chro ...

, where the ex-WP Shafter Subdivision now begins, were converted to a directional running setup.Don Strack
UtahRails.net: Union Pacific in Utah, 1900-1996
accessed August 2008

References

{{reflist Railroad cutoffs Union Pacific Railroad lines Los Angeles and Salt Lake Railroad Rail infrastructure in Utah 1874 establishments in Utah Territory Railway lines opened in 1874