The Gateway Eastern Railway is a

railroad Rail transport (also known as train transport) is a means of transport that transfers passengers and goods on wheeled vehicles running on rails, which are incorporated in tracks. In contrast to road transport, where the vehicles run on a pre ...

subsidiary of the

Kansas City Southern Railway The Kansas City Southern Railway Company is an American Class I railroad. Founded in 1887, it operates in 10 midwestern and southeastern U.S. states: Illinois, Missouri, Kansas, Oklahoma, Arkansas, Tennessee, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana and ...

(KCS) (Later the

CPKC Railway Canadian Pacific Kansas City Limited, doing business as CPKC, is a Class I railroad in North America that resulted from the merger of Canadian Pacific Railway (CP) and Kansas City Southern (KCS) on April 14, 2023. It is the first and currentl ...

), owning a main line between

East Alton East Alton is a village in Madison County, Illinois, United States. The population was 6,301 at the 2010 census. History East Alton was incorporated as a village in 1893 (some say 1894). William Cobb, namesake of Cobb Street, was one of the fir ...

and

East St. Louis, Illinois East St. Louis is a city in St. Clair County, Illinois. It is directly across the Mississippi River from Downtown St. Louis, Missouri and the Gateway Arch National Park. East St. Louis is in the Metro-East region of Southern Illinois. Once a bus ...

, United States. Originally created in 1994 as a subsidiary of the

Gateway Western Railway The Gateway Western Railway was a Class II railroad that operated 408 miles of former Chicago and Alton Railroad track between Kansas City, Missouri, Kansas City and St. Louis, Missouri. It also operated between Kansas City, Missouri, and Spring ...

, which acquired the East St. Louis-

Kansas City The Kansas City metropolitan area is a bi-state metropolitan area anchored by Kansas City, Missouri. Its 14 counties straddle the border between the U.S. states of Missouri (9 counties) and Kansas (5 counties). With and a population of more ...

line of the Chicago, Missouri and Western Railway in 1990, it was acquired by KCS along with its parent in 1997.

History

The line between East St. Louis and East Alton was completed by the Belleville and Illinoistown Railroad in 1856, as an extension of its Belleville-East St. Louis (Illinoistown) line. Ownership passed to the St. Louis, Alton and Terre Haute Railroad, a predecessor of the

Illinois Central Railroad The Illinois Central Railroad , sometimes called the Main Line of Mid-America, was a railroad in the Central United States, with its primary routes connecting Chicago, Illinois, with New Orleans, Louisiana, and Mobile, Alabama. A line also co ...

, but in 1890 that company sold that segment to the Cairo, Vincennes and Chicago Railway, which became part of the

Cleveland, Cincinnati, Chicago and St. Louis Railway The Cleveland, Cincinnati, Chicago and St. Louis Railway, also known as the Big Four Railroad and commonly abbreviated CCC&StL, was a railroad company in the Midwestern United States. It operated in affiliation with the New York Central system. ...

(Big Four) and eventually the

New York Central Railroad The New York Central Railroad was a railroad primarily operating in the Great Lakes and Mid-Atlantic regions of the United States. The railroad primarily connected greater New York and Boston in the east with Chicago and St. Louis in the Midw ...

and

Conrail Conrail , formally the Consolidated Rail Corporation, was the primary Class I railroad in the Northeastern United States between 1976 and 1999. The trade name Conrail is a portmanteau based on the company's legal name. It continues to do busin ...

. By 1906, the parallel Big Four and

Chicago and Alton Railroad The Alton Railroad was the final name of a railroad linking Chicago to Alton, Illinois; St. Louis, Missouri; and Kansas City, Missouri. Its predecessor, the Chicago and Alton Railroad , was purchased by the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad in 1931 an ...

lines between Bridge Junction (East St. Louis) and Wann (near East Alton), the former just east of the latter, were being operated as a double-track line by both companies through reciprocal

trackage rights Railway companies can interact with and control others in many ways. These relationships can be complicated by bankruptcies. Operating Often, when a railroad first opens, it is only a short spur of a main line. The owner of the spur line may con ...

. In July 1993, the

Interstate Commerce Commission The Interstate Commerce Commission (ICC) was a regulatory agency in the United States created by the Interstate Commerce Act of 1887. The agency's original purpose was to regulate railroads (and later trucking) to ensure fair rates, to eliminat ...

approved purchase by Gateway Eastern of this line from Conrail, as well as a segment of the ex-

Pennsylvania Railroad The Pennsylvania Railroad (reporting mark PRR), legal name The Pennsylvania Railroad Company also known as the "Pennsy", was an American Class I railroad that was established in 1846 and headquartered in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It was named ...

Main Line (Pittsburgh to St. Louis) The Pittsburgh to St. Louis Main Line was a rail line owned and operated by the Pennsylvania Railroad in the U.S. states of Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois. The line ran from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania west via Steubenville, Ohio, Columbus, ...

from the

Mississippi River The Mississippi River is the second-longest river and chief river of the second-largest drainage system in North America, second only to the Hudson Bay drainage system. From its traditional source of Lake Itasca in northern Minnesota, it f ...

just north of the

Eads Bridge The Eads Bridge is a combined road and railway bridge over the Mississippi River connecting the cities of St. Louis, Missouri and East St. Louis, Illinois. It is located on the St. Louis riverfront between Laclede's Landing, to the north, and t ...

to Conrail's Rose Lake Yard at

Willows Willows, also called sallows and osiers, from the genus ''Salix'', comprise around 400 speciesMabberley, D.J. 1997. The Plant Book, Cambridge University Press #2: Cambridge. of typically deciduous trees and shrubs, found primarily on moist so ...

. A short segment of

over the

Terminal Railroad Association of St. Louis The Terminal Railroad Association of St. Louis is a Class III switching and terminal railroad that handles traffic in the St. Louis, Missouri, metropolitan area. It is co-owned by five of the six Class I railroads that reach the city. Present ope ...

's (TRRA's) Eads Subdivision, also acquired from Conrail, connected the two lines. Gateway Eastern also had access to

CSX Transportation CSX Transportation , known colloquially as simply CSX, is a Class I freight railroad operating in the Eastern United States and the Canadian provinces of Ontario and Quebec. The railroad operates approximately 21,000 route miles () of track. ...

's Cone Yard, west of Willows. Operations began January 28, 1994. In order to connect its sections without trackage rights, Gateway Western bought a strip of land from

on which it planned to build the "Q Connection", crossing the TRRA north of "Q Tower". After a seven-year legal battle with the TRRA, during which Gateway Western placed the line in service in May 1995 through a temporary

injunction An injunction is a legal and equitable remedy in the form of a special court order that compels a party to do or refrain from specific acts. ("The court of appeals ... has exclusive jurisdiction to enjoin, set aside, suspend (in whole or in pa ...

, the courts ruled in favor of Gateway Western, then part of KCS, in 1998.

Operations

Gateway Eastern's primary business was switching ex-Conrail customers in the Alton area from Conrail's Rose Lake Yard (now CSX). It had one locomotive, a 1969 EMD

GP38 The EMD GP38 is a four-axle diesel-electric locomotive built by General Motors Electro-Motive Division between January 1966 and December 1971. The locomotive's prime mover was an EMD 645 16-cylinder engine that generated . The company built 70 ...

, and operated one scheduled train per day, five days per week. Interchange was with its parent Gateway Western, Conrail, and the

Southern Pacific Transportation Company The Southern Pacific (or Espee from the railroad initials- SP) was an American Class I railroad network that existed from 1865 to 1996 and operated largely in the Western United States. The system was operated by various companies under the ...

subsidiary SPCSL. The reciprocal trackage rights agreement from 1906 with the Alton continues to this day, now between Gateway Eastern and the

Union Pacific Railroad The Union Pacific Railroad , legally Union Pacific Railroad Company and often called simply Union Pacific, is a freight-hauling railroad that operates 8,300 locomotives over routes in 23 U.S. states west of Chicago and New Orleans. Union Paci ...

(successor to SPCSL, purchaser of the ex-Alton main line).

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Gateway Eastern Railway Illinois railroads Predecessors of the Kansas City Southern Railway Railway companies established in 1994 Spin-offs of Conrail