Jenson Tunnel
How about another frame from this highlight of the trip!
And this was one of the other three main goals of the trip and certainly the most obscure and least accessible requiring a drive down a sketchy dirt road and then a one way hike down the RofW in brutal 90+ degree heat and humidity. But, when I learned about the only rail tunnel in the state of Oklahoma I knew I needed to see it someday!
This is the Jenson tunnel on Kansas City Southern's modern day Fort Smith branch. The 1180 ft bore was drilled through Backbone Mountain in 1885-86 by the Frisco controlled Fort Smith & Southern Railway back when this was still part of the Choctaw Nation in Indian Territory. The route through the tunnel was once exceptionally busy and has a truly fascinating history. To learn more I highly recommend this pdf: s3.amazonaws.com/dayoneweb/364/1810.pdf Today KCS uses it primarily to serve the OK Foods elevator and a few smaller customers as well as conduct a but of interchange with the Arkansa and Missouri and Fort Smith Railroad shortlines.
KCS began operating over this line on trackage rights after their own Fort Smith branch from Spiro was abandoned following flood damage in 1943. Frisco successor Burlington Northern severed this line which was known as the Arthur Subdivision in 1983 but continued to travel through this tunnel for another year or so down to Poteau and Wister. Once they abandoned the segment from those two points the BN no longer traveled south of Fort Smith and to protect their access KCS leased the line in 1985 then purchased it outright in 1989. Meanwhile in 1986 the balance of the old SLSF Central Division north of Fort Smith was sold to the new Arkansas and Missouri Railroad which runs it to this day.
KCS' 28 mile long branch has many superlative photo ops, but this was tops on my list. Here is the M-F local freight known as the Fort Smith Dodger (train RHV106 03) on the return trip south (railroad west) to the mainline in Poteau and their starting point at Heavener Yard. Leading the in Southern Belle paint are KCS 2976 (GP40-3 rebuild originally blt. Feb. 1981 new for the railroad as GP40-2 796) and 2808 (GP40-3 rebuild originally blt. May 1966 as straight GP40 WP 3503).
LeFlore County, Oklahoma
Friday September 3, 2021
Jenson Tunnel
How about another frame from this highlight of the trip!
And this was one of the other three main goals of the trip and certainly the most obscure and least accessible requiring a drive down a sketchy dirt road and then a one way hike down the RofW in brutal 90+ degree heat and humidity. But, when I learned about the only rail tunnel in the state of Oklahoma I knew I needed to see it someday!
This is the Jenson tunnel on Kansas City Southern's modern day Fort Smith branch. The 1180 ft bore was drilled through Backbone Mountain in 1885-86 by the Frisco controlled Fort Smith & Southern Railway back when this was still part of the Choctaw Nation in Indian Territory. The route through the tunnel was once exceptionally busy and has a truly fascinating history. To learn more I highly recommend this pdf: s3.amazonaws.com/dayoneweb/364/1810.pdf Today KCS uses it primarily to serve the OK Foods elevator and a few smaller customers as well as conduct a but of interchange with the Arkansa and Missouri and Fort Smith Railroad shortlines.
KCS began operating over this line on trackage rights after their own Fort Smith branch from Spiro was abandoned following flood damage in 1943. Frisco successor Burlington Northern severed this line which was known as the Arthur Subdivision in 1983 but continued to travel through this tunnel for another year or so down to Poteau and Wister. Once they abandoned the segment from those two points the BN no longer traveled south of Fort Smith and to protect their access KCS leased the line in 1985 then purchased it outright in 1989. Meanwhile in 1986 the balance of the old SLSF Central Division north of Fort Smith was sold to the new Arkansas and Missouri Railroad which runs it to this day.
KCS' 28 mile long branch has many superlative photo ops, but this was tops on my list. Here is the M-F local freight known as the Fort Smith Dodger (train RHV106 03) on the return trip south (railroad west) to the mainline in Poteau and their starting point at Heavener Yard. Leading the in Southern Belle paint are KCS 2976 (GP40-3 rebuild originally blt. Feb. 1981 new for the railroad as GP40-2 796) and 2808 (GP40-3 rebuild originally blt. May 1966 as straight GP40 WP 3503).
LeFlore County, Oklahoma
Friday September 3, 2021