Mention is made in the September issue of "Trains", that in the near future the Southwest Chief could shift off the Albuquerque, Raton Pass, Trinidad CO route in favour of BNSF Railway's Transcon via Amarillo. Does anyone know what route the train would take and what towns it would pass through? If this eventuates a lot of great scenery will be lost.
I posted this on the Amtrak Facebook site as well as here.
The train would take the former Santa Fe's Southern District. Newton, KS, would be the split point. Westbound, the train would turn south at Newton, heading to Wichita. A few miles south of Wichita, at Mulvane, KS, the route splits again. The "fork" to the left (east) takes you through Udall, down to Winfield, Arkansas City, and on south to Oklahoma City, Fort Worth, and Houston. The "fork" to the right at Mulvane takes you through Belle Plaine and into Wellington. I would imagine the Chief would take this route, to pick up Wichita. From Wellington, the line heads west/southwest through Harper, Attica, and Kiowa, KS, and into northwest Oklahoma. In Oklahoma, the line passes through Capron, Alva, Avard, Waynoka, and twists through the hills toward Woodward. Then, it's into the Texas Panhandle, passing through Higgins, Glazier, Canadian, Miami, and Pampa, before reaching Amarillo. (Someone correct me if I'm wrong on any of this.) From Amarillo, the line goes south to Canyon, and then turns west/southwest, passing through Joel, Hereford, Wilsey, Farwell-Texico, and then into east-central New Mexico. Clovis is right there, as the line enters NM.
Out of Clovis, still westbound, the line goes pretty much straight west, passing through Melrose, Fort Sumner, Yeso, and then snakes around into Vaughn. Just west of Vaughn, the line crosses over the UP line to/from Tucumcari. (Former SP, I'm told.) The line continues through lots of curves and terrain as it runs through Lucy and Mountainair. The major landmark on this stretch would be Abo Canyon, between Scholle and Sais. Abo Canyon is just southeast of Belen, which is a hub. From Belen, the line runs north to Dalies, where it meets up with the original Raton/Albuquerque route and turns west for Gallup, Winslow, Flagstaff, Kingman, Barstow, San Bernardino, and LA.
I have no idea what station stops a rerouted Southwest Chief would make. My guesses would be, westbound after Newton, KS:
Wichita
Wellington (crew change?)
Kiowa (maybe?)
Alva (maybe? for Northwest Oklahoma State University?)
Woodward (maybe?)
Pampa
Amarillo
Canyon (maybe? for Palo Duro Canyon?)
Clovis (crew change?)
Vaughn (maybe? gateway to Roswell?)
Belen (crew change?)
Again, these are only guesses... with a healthy dose of wishful thinking.
There's been a lot of talk on other forums about a possible move of #3/#4 to the Southern District, and there's been a lot of speculation about how Albuquerque would be handled. I'm told there is a wye at ABQ, and I think (?) it's big enough for Amtrak to turn the entire train. If they continue to serve ABQ, it will be a time-consuming move. The Southern District will shorten the Chief's running time between Newton and Albuquerque/Belen, but the run between Belen and Albuquerque would add time. Any time "made up" running the Southern District would seemingly be lost in whatever moves they had to make to get into and out of Albuquerque.
In terms of scenery, I think the only gain would be Abo Canyon. The losses would be Raton Pass, Glorieta Pass, Canoncito/Canyoncito, and Apache Canyon, as well as the multiple pueblos between Lamy and Albuquerque.
I wish I'd been old enough to ride the San Francisco Chief, so I could've seen this route in person. I've ridden the Southwest Chief many times between Chicago and LA, with varying endpoints in between, and I'm glad I've had the chance to do that. My last trip was in December 2007, traveling between Topeka, KS, and Flagstaff, AZ. I took pictures like crazy, especially going over Raton Pass and going through Apache Canyon, and I wondered if that trip might be my last over that line.
It'll be interesting to see what happens.
