The Mid-Pacific Railroad was an idea proposed by Andrew Stevenson in 1929 to build and operate a 1,000-mile-long north-to-south railroad through central and eastern

Nevada Nevada ( ; ) is a state in the Western region of the United States. It is bordered by Oregon to the northwest, Idaho to the northeast, California to the west, Arizona to the southeast, and Utah to the east. Nevada is the 7th-most extensive, ...

and southern

California California is a state in the Western United States, located along the Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the most populous U.S. state and the 3rd largest by area. It is also the ...

.Myrick, David F. : Railroads of Nevada & Eastern California: Volume I, The Northern Roads, pg.86-89. Had it been built, the railroad would have run from

Battle Mountain, Nevada Battle Mountain is an unincorporated town in and the county seat of Lander County, Nevada, United States. The population was 3,635 at the 2010 census. Its primary economic base is gold mining and, to a lesser extent, legalized gambling. The t ...

Barstow, California Barstow is a city in San Bernardino County, California, in the Mojave Desert of Southern California. Located in the Inland Empire region of California, the population was 25,415 at the 2020 census. Barstow is an important crossroads for the In ...

with a branch line to

Reno, Nevada Reno ( ) is a city in the northwest section of the U.S. state of Nevada, along the Nevada-California border, about north from Lake Tahoe, known as "The Biggest Little City in the World". Known for its casino and tourism industry, Reno is the c ...

via

Tonopah, Nevada Tonopah ( , Shoshoni language: Tonampaa) is an unincorporated town in, and the county seat of, Nye County, Nevada, United States. It is located at the junction of U.S. Routes 6 and 95, approximately midway between Las Vegas and Reno. In ...

, over parts of track belonging to the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railroad,

Southern Pacific Railroad The Southern Pacific (or Espee from the railroad initials- SP) 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 ...

and the

Union Pacific Railroad The Union Pacific Railroad , legally Union Pacific Railroad Company and often called simply Union Pacific, is a freight-hauling railroad that operates 8,300 locomotives over routes in 23 U.S. states west of Chicago and New Orleans. Union Pac ...

, and over the routes of several shortline and

narrow gauge A narrow-gauge railway (narrow-gauge railroad in the US) is a railway with a track gauge narrower than standard . Most narrow-gauge railways are between and . Since narrow-gauge railways are usually built with tighter curves, smaller struc ...

railroads located within Southern California and Nevada, including the

Tonopah and Tidewater Railroad The Tonopah and Tidewater Railroad was a former class II railroad that served eastern California and southwestern Nevada. The railroad was built mainly to haul borax from Francis Marion Smith's Pacific Coast Borax Company mines located just ea ...

, Bullfrog Goldfield Railroad, Las Vegas and Tonopah Railroad, Tonopah and Goldfield Railroad, Nevada Central Railroad, Virginia and Truckee Railroad,

Eureka and Palisade Railroad The Eureka & Palisade Railroad was a narrow gauge railroad constructed in 1873-1875 between Palisade and Eureka, Nevada, a distance of approximately . The railroad was constructed to connect Eureka, the center of a rich silver mining area, wi ...

, and the Nevada Copper Belt Railroad, with new railroads built in between to stitch these lines together. It would have cost an average of $10,658,000 to build. The plan was put forward in 1932 to a group of men in the Nevada Manhattan Corporation and the railroads involved, described as a way to ''"bring the Great Northern into

Los Angeles Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the wor ...

."'' Several of the railroad companies involved expressed interest in the plan, but the project was never completed due to the combined effects of the Great Depression, the abandonment of the

gold standard A gold standard is a Backed currency, monetary system in which the standard economics, economic unit of account is based on a fixed quantity of gold. The gold standard was the basis for the international monetary system from the 1870s to the ...

by the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., federal district, five ma ...

and

Great Britain Great Britain is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean off the northwest coast of continental Europe. With an area of , it is the largest of the British Isles, the largest European island and the ninth-largest island in the world. It is ...

in 1932, and Stevenson's death in 1933.

References

* * * {{Refend, 26em Proposed rail infrastructure in the United States