Operates on the former UP Cascade branch that is now Idaho Northern & Pacific. Thunder Mountain owned by same family that owns Rio Grande Pacific (parent of IN&P, Nebraska Central, New Orleans & Lower Coast (correct name?), and Wichita, Tillman & Jackson.

I rode years ago out of Cascade to Smiths Ferry (which is mostly isolated from roads), but it looks like everything is now only out of Horseshoe Bend.

With the implosion of Boise Cascade and the timber industry, most of the mills that provided the IN&P with traffic are gone. There isn't any freight traffic left on the Cascade line, just the Unimin sand plant out of Emmett for one train a week the last I heard. All the branches leased out of the Boise/Nampa area are now Watco's Boise Valley.

The only part of the IN&P left with traffic is the Oregon division out of La Grande. Propane to Island City; chemicals in for glue and particle board out at Baum; grain moving steady (about 25 cars a week?) at Alicell; plywood and stids from Elgin, plus storage cars off the Wallowa Union. IN&P local works Monday-Friday, usually mid-day. Trains beyond Baum/Alicell maybe three times a week depending on traffic. Boise is filling up the log deck at the mill in La Grande, so it may reopen soon. (I'm not sure if IN&P or UP switches this mill.) Not much local traffic left on the UP between Huntington and La Grande, the local out of Huntington switches cement plant at Durkee (if it is running), and towards Baker or La Grande only as needed.