More Grain in Portland

BNSF grain train at East Portland Junction.

The flow of grain continues through Portland at a rapid pace. Both downtown grain elevators, the O'Dock pictured here and Irving just to the north, are currently loading boats. Late this afternoon, a loaded BNSF grain train entered Union Pacific trackage, coming through Union Station and across the Steel Bridge, from whence it proceeded to Albina yard. Plenty of BNSF grain is unloaded on the UP side of the river, as this photo shows, but this was the first time that I have seen a solid BNSF unit grain train take this routing. Usually I have seen BNSF grain cars come across the river in the manifest of the UP's Lake Transfer train, which makes a daily interchange run between the two railroads' yards. Today's competition between the UP and BNSF dates back to era of James Hill on the Great Northern and Edward Harriman on the UP, but cooperation also happens.