WAUWATOSA, Wis. — CPKC’s main line across Wisconsin has reopened after being closed Satuday night by torrential rains, disrupting freight and Amtrak operations.
Locations near Milwaukee reported as much as 14.5 inches of rain between Saturday evening and 2 p.m. on Sunday, according to WISN-TV. Wauwatosa, Wis., just west of Milwaukee, reported 7.15 inches; there, the Menomonee River overflowed its banks, with water flowing across the CPKC main line. As of 3 p.m. Sunday, crews were working to clear debris where the rail line crosses the river in downtown Wauwatosa, where water was still at the height of the bridge.
The line was reopened late Sunday night.
The eastbound Empire Builder, which had been held for several hours Sunday at the Duplainville crossing with Canadian National in Pewaukee, Wis., was eventually terminated there, with passengers bused the remainer of the route and the train deadheaded into Chicago. The westbound Builder departed Milwaukee at 12:02 a.m. today (Aug. 11) after being held for more than seven hours, then suffered another delay in Columbus, Wis., for recrewing after its crew reached its hours-of-service limit. As of 8 a.m., it had just left Wisconsin Dells, Wis., some 13 hours, 17 minutes late.
Sunday’s Borealis trains were also disrupted. The eastbound train was terminated in Pewaukee, with passengers bused to Milwaukee and Chicago, while the westbound train used a bus bridge to get passengers from Milwaukee to Pewaukee, where the earlier eastbound train was turned. That train ended up arriving in Minneapolis-St. Paul at 1:24 a.m. today, 6 hours, 28 minutes late.
— Updated at 7:50 p.m. CT with later information on status of Amtrak trains; updated Aug. 11 at 87:40 a.m. CT with line reopened and revised Amtrak information.
In the last three decades, we in the western suburbs of Milwaukee have had two hundred-year floods and now this thousand-year flood.
For people who haven’t seen other photos, this photo does not tell the story. Water was up to the top of the trusses. Not standing water but a rapidly flowing torrent.
On Wednesday 13th, three days after the storm, I rode my bike to ‘Tosa to see what was happening. Ballast was being renewed but the trains were running.
Interesting that the railroad suffered little damage while nearby portions of the bike path were washout out.
An interesting factoid is that this time CP(KC) tracks upstream in Elm Grove (Waukesha County) do not appear to have been affected. Elm Grove’s flood control scheme after the annual hundred-year floods in 1997 and 1998 seem to have worked.
A historic event in Pewaukee who hasn’t had a passenger train stop since 1998, Hiawatha Extension, and earlier the termination of the Cannon Ball in 1971.
Opps, I am corrected, the Cannon Ball was ended in 1972.