ATSF KC TO EMPORIA & HOWARD BRANCH 1928 - 1934

ATSF KC TO EMPORIA & HOWARD BRANCH 1928 - 1934

This Santa FE Route is placed in 1928 and through 1935. ATSF in Emporia Kansas rebuilt the entire Yards and Engine Roundhouse in 1928. This route is the La Junta Colorado Subdivision. 1934 was the Map I used for Shawnee Kansas that is very accurate for the Kansas City Argintine Yard for that time. Both Maps are digital elevation maps that are very accurate. The Argintine Yard had a passenger car yard for making up trains that would be moved to Kansas City Union Station.
I made the 2 maps seperate and joined them together to make the real distance shorter from Kansas City to Emporia for the Game. The Tracks between the Citys are 2 track 1 east and 1 west bound. Both Yards are full scale and you can have mile long trains inter either yard. On the east side of Emporia there at the Junction is a Branch line called the Howard Branch that went south and was completed in 1879 to Moline Kansas for a total of 84 miles long. Moline had a 2 stall Engine house. Moline is a small town between Winfield Kansas and Chanute Kansas. The Engines at Moline were a 2-8-2 and a 2-6-2. The 2-8-2 was used on heavy trains. Chanute had control over all ATSF movements in Southeast Kansas including Pittsburg KS, on the Girard Ks sub. Crawford county Kansas was a mining district for Coal, Zinc, and Lead.The money that came out of the area was named pittsburg after the out east USA city. I have the 1906 platt maps for this area off the internet. 4 railroads that served of the area. That is anouther Model trainz route I will finish one of these days?.

This time frame allows for a interisting bunch of freight cars. I have pictures of the yards that show 36ft Wood sided metal end bocars along with wood gondolas. Also usra outside braced single sheathed box cars. Steam Engines both coal and Oil Burners. I did learn that The Cowboys did ride with the Cattle in a Special Caboose called the Drovers Caboose. The Emporia yard had a special track just for Droovers Cabooses. near the control tower.So far there is no ATSF Praire loco anywhere. ATSF Passenger stations? I just picked whatever that looked ok for the area. The problem with Modeling a real place and Historic things.

The Chism Trail hearding Cattle with Cowboys was coming to an end because of range wars and Farmers Fencing in their property. So the Railroad was used. This Branchline transported thousands of head of cattle with feed lots along the branchline that have Blue Stem grass in the flint hills that cattle love, from Texas Up north to Emporia Kansas at the ATSF owned Feed yard,Pause a moment! The ATSF Railroad Owned the Stockyards! not only that but did all the upkeep!. Most of the feed lots had scales to weigh the cattle. Trainz does not have any that would be near the loading chute. The info for the feedlots along the way tell how many stockcars they would hold. I finally figuerd out if the lot holds 100 head then that would be, 20 head per stockcar adding up to 5 stockcars.
The Emporia Kansas Yard was very busy, Actualy 5 yards in one. The Local yd, The Arival Yard, East bound Yard, West bound Yard, The Stockyard.

Oil was discoverd in Greenwood County kansas and that brought in a lot of people!. President Truman payed for land lease and drilled down 1000 feet but nothing. He was broke and sold the dry well to one of the big Oil Companys that drilled on down anouther 1000 feet and hit the mother load!. Later Truman said if he would have hit oil, he would have never got into politics. I have modeled tank car loading areas in the oil fields on this route to transport tank cars to Kansas city Sincliar Fuel Oil refinery. In turn the Fuel Oil is used in every town for Heat in homes. This was after homes used coal but some still did, So there are Coaling stages in most towns. There is a large Limestone Quarry east of Moline where it was shiped up to Emporia in gondolas for the cement plant. I set up the quarry to have it's own steam engine that is fictional, a small 0-4-0 to handle all the wood gondolas and supplys for the rock chrusher. The real name for the Quarry was known

ATSF KC TO EMPORIA & HOWARD BRANCH 1928 - 1934