The Salt Lake City Southern Railroad is a

short-line railroad A shortline railroad is a small or mid-sized railroad company that operates over a relatively short distance relative to larger, national railroad networks. The term is used primarily in the United States and Canada. In the former, railroads are ...

operating between

Salt Lake City Salt Lake City, often shortened to Salt Lake or SLC, is the capital and most populous city of the U.S. state of Utah. It is the county seat of Salt Lake County, the most populous county in the state. The city is the core of the Salt Lake Ci ...

, and Murray, in

Utah Utah is a landlocked state in the Mountain states, Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It is one of the Four Corners states, sharing a border with Arizona, Colorado, and New Mexico. It also borders Wyoming to the northea ...

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

. The SL began operating on April 19, 1993, as a

RailTex RailTex was a transportation holding company that specialized in owning and operating short line railroads across North America. Based in San Antonio, Texas Texas ( , ; or ) is the most populous U.S. state, state in the South Central U ...

subsidiary A subsidiary, subsidiary company, or daughter company is a company (law), company completely or partially owned or controlled by another company, called the parent company or holding company, which has legal and financial control over the subsidia ...

. Today the SL is a subsidiary of the

Utah Railway The Utah Railway is a class III railroad operating in Utah and Colorado, and owned by Genesee & Wyoming Inc. History The Utah Railway Company was incorporated on January 24, 1912, with the name of Utah Coal Railway, shortened to Utah Railway ...

and is owned by the Genesee & Wyoming Inc.

History

The line was originally built between 1871 and 1872 by the Utah Southern Railroad. By March 30, 1872, the Utah Southern reached Point of the Mountain, which is the southern end of the Salt Lake City Southern Railroad at Mount. In the 1870s, the Utah Southern was constructing a line from Salt Lake City to Chicken Creek (

Juab County Juab County ( ) is a county in western Utah, United States. As of the 2020 United States census, the population was 11,786. Its county seat and largest city is Nephi. Juab County is part of the Provo– Orem, Utah Metropolitan Statisti ...

Brigham Young Brigham Young ( ; June 1, 1801August 29, 1877) was an American religious leader and politician. He was the second President of the Church (LDS Church), president of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church) from 1847 until h ...

was listed as the railroad's president. In June 1875 financial control of the railroad was turned over to the

Union Pacific Railroad The Union Pacific Railroad is a Railroad classes, Class I freight-hauling railroad that operates 8,300 locomotives over routes in 23 U.S. states west of Chicago and New Orleans. Union Pacific is the second largest railroad in the United Stat ...

. On July 1, 1881, the Utah Southern was consolidated into the Utah Central Railway. The Utah Central was building a rail network from Ogden–

Milford Milford may refer to: Place names Canada * Milford (Annapolis), Nova Scotia * Milford (Halifax), Nova Scotia * Milford, Ontario England * Milford, Derbyshire * Milford, Devon, a place in Devon * Milford on Sea, Hampshire * Milford, Shro ...

. By 1888 the Utah Central was an

operating subsidiary An operating subsidiary is a subsidiary of a corporation through which the parent company (which may or may not be a holding company) indirectly conducts some portion of its business. Usually, an operating subsidiary can be distinguished in that ...

of the Union Pacific Railroad. On August 1, 1889, the Utah Central was consolidated into the Oregon Short Line and Utah Northern Railway, an operating subsidiary of the Union Pacific. On March 1, 1897, the railway was renamed the

Oregon Short Line Railroad The Oregon Short Line Railroad was a railroad in Wyoming, Idaho, Utah, Montana and Oregon in the United States. The line was organized as the Oregon Short Line Railway in 1881 as a subsidiary of the Union Pacific Railway. The Union Pacific int ...

(OSL). The OSL, a UP subsidiary, was leased to the UP on January 1, 1936. From 1936 to 1993 the Union Pacific operated the tracks as part of their "Provo Subdivision." In the 1990s the UP shifted its trains on the Provo Subdivision to the Denver and Rio Grande Western Railroad tracks between Salt Lake City and American Fork. The UP no longer needed the line between Salt Lake City and Mount (also known as Mound or Point of the Mountain). RailTex acquired the line between Salt Lake City and Mount and began operations in 1993 as the Salt Lake City Southern Railroad. Today the

Utah Transit Authority The Utah Transit Authority (UTA) is a special service district responsible for providing public transportation throughout the Wasatch Front of Utah, in the United States, which includes the metropolitan areas of Ogden, Utah, Ogden, Park City, U ...

(UTA light rail) owns much of the track as part of their light rail

right-of-way A right of way (also right-of-way) is a specific route that people, animals, vehicles, watercraft, or utility lines travel, or the legal status that gives them the right to do so. Rights-of-way in the physical sense include controlled-access h ...

acquisitions. UTA utilized the right-of-way for its TRAX

light rail Light rail (or light rail transit, abbreviated to LRT) is a form of passenger urban rail transit that uses rolling stock derived from tram technology National Conference of the Transportation Research Board while also having some features from ...

system, and is used, at least in part, by all three of its TRAX lines (

Blue Blue is one of the three primary colours in the RYB color model, RYB colour model (traditional colour theory), as well as in the RGB color model, RGB (additive) colour model. It lies between Violet (color), violet and cyan on the optical spe ...

Green Green is the color between cyan and yellow on the visible spectrum. It is evoked by light which has a dominant wavelength of roughly 495570 nm. In subtractive color systems, used in painting and color printing, it is created by a com ...

, and

Red Red is the color at the long wavelength end of the visible spectrum of light, next to orange and opposite violet. It has a dominant wavelength of approximately 625–750 nanometres. It is a primary color in the RGB color model and a seconda ...

, but primarily the Blue Line). The SL operates over the UTA tracks via

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 c ...

. On September 30, 1999, the SL became a subsidiary of the

Sources

* * * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Salt Lake City Southern Railroad Utah railroads Switching and terminal railroads Genesee & Wyoming Spin-offs of the Union Pacific Railroad