![]() ![]() He also owns Grand Canyon Railway through his Xanterra Travel Collection, a resort management company that does work mostly in national parks, including Grand Canyon, Yellowstone, and Glacier.īy 2017, Pikes Peak Cog was a tired and rundown railroad. ![]() Anschutz is no stranger to railroading, having purchased Denver & Rio Grande Western back in 1984 (he sold the Rio Grande, by then combined with Southern Pacific, to Union Pacific in 1995). Current owner Phillip Anschutz, through his Anschutz Corporation, purchased the assets of Broadmoor Hotel, including the railroad, in 2011. ![]() ![]() Over the last 130 years, there have been only four owners of the line. On the left, one of the older Swiss Locomotive & Machine trains built in the 1970s and 1980s keeps the main line going downhill while one of the new Stadler trains (right) stays in the siding. Steam power was the mainstay on the railroad until September 1958.ĪBOVE: Two trains meet at Windy Point, elevation 12,129 feet, on October 23, 2021. Three Baldwin 26-ton coal-burning steam engines were ordered for the start of service, and by 1906, three additional steam locomotives joined the roster. After two years of hard, back-breaking work, the first train reached the 14,115-foot summit on June 30, 1891. In September 1889, hundreds of foreign laborers began construction almost all the work was done with simple tools - pickaxes, shovels, and wheelbarrows. The newly chartered Manitou & Pike’s Peak Railway Company of 1888 used a standard gauge, nine-mile-long, center double-toothed Abt Rail cog system to cope with grades up to 25 percent along the way (the average grade is 16 percent). The idea for the cog railway is credited to former Manitou Springs Mayor John Hulbert, a Civil War veteran and investor in the original failed venture. In 1883, a group of investors began to work on a 27-mile-long narrow gauge adhesion railroad to the summit, but financial issues quickly torpedoed that effort. The plan to build a railroad to the summit of Pikes Peak dates back to the early 1880s. The nine-mile railroad is one of only two cog railways in the United States and it’s also among the busiest tourist railroads in Colorado (a state with more than its fair share of heritage railways). After a hiatus of almost four years, Broadmoor, Manitou & Pikes Peak Cog Railway resumed running in May 2021 and, following a $100 million rebuild, the future of the world’s highest cog railway appears secure. Justin Franz photoįortunately, that didn’t happen. The building on the right was once a trolley depot but now houses the cog railway’s main offices. Was this to be the end of more than a century of operation, pushing the iconic cog railway to the pages of history like other local railroads, such as Colorado Midland, Midland Terminal, and Mount Manitou Incline Railways?ĪBOVE: A train prepares to depart the rebuilt Manitou Springs, Colo., station on October 22, 2021. #Pikes peak cog railroad upgrade#But that pause in service revealed that a lot of money would be needed to upgrade the century-old cog railway to 21st century standards. Six months before that press release was issued, the railroad had been shut down in late 2017 for maintenance. The release went on to point out that operations were doubtful for the railway’s foreseeable future, given the lack of maintenance on the equipment and right-of-way for the previous decade. The Broadmoor Hotel, which owns the railway operation, issued a terse press release stating that after 126 years in business, there would be no spring 2018 reopening, after an almost-six-month shutdown. In March 2018, the future of Colorado’s Broadmoor, Manitou & Pikes Peak Cog Railway was in doubt. ![]()
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