Ever since the UP abolished the MEUPD / MPDEU (the valley local between Albina and Eugene) we have seen congestion much like the meltdown during the UP / SP merger on the entire Portland Service Unit. To save money, UP relied on an oversized MPDRV / MRVPD to do the work and they promptly died every trip and had to be recrewed.

Oregon Pacific at one time last week had 63 cars in the Portland terminal area destined to the Molalla Division and NONE in our Canby interchange on Monday morning. The LIL75 (Oregon City Switcher) brought out 9 cars that had been set out at Clackamas mid week which allowed us to go through the motions of running a railroad.

Further complicating matters is the two tie gangs working north from Eugene which require work window curfews. Fortunately they are currently off until December 1st which has helped velocity somewhat. I've been promised an 18 car setout at Canby for Monday...we'll see what materializes.

Once the tie gangs are gone they will be replaced by the curve gang laying new rail on the curves requiring more work windows.

Kinda hard to provide dependable scheduled service when the Class I is in meltdown.

Dick Samuels
Oregon Pacific Railroad