October 2005 Railways Illustrated 65

IntroductionThe White Pass and Yukon Railway wasconstructed to service the Klondike Goldrush in 1898, starting in Alaska at the portof Skagway the line crosses into Canada’sBritish Colombia and terminates atWhitehorse in the Yukon Territory.

The 110 mile, 3ft gauge single track linewas built in two years, two months andtwo days, an amazing achievementconsidering the mountainous terrain andharsh winters along the route. The lastspike was driven in on 29 July 1900 atCarcross in the Yukon Territory.

The Railroad operated as a commoncarrier line until 1982 when, a severe dropin mineral prices crippled the Yukonmining industry and the construction of theKlondike highway removed most of thefreight carried. The railway closed for sixyears before reopening as a touristoperation as far as Bennett BC, 40 milesfrom Skagway.

From the deep water port of Skagway on

the Lynn Canal, which is actually a Fjordconnected to the Pacific Ocean, the lineclimbs the 2,865 ft to White Pass summit injust 20 miles, with a maximum gradient of1:26 (3.9%).

HistoryLeaving the city of Skagway the line passesthe WP&YR shops around two miles outand follows the Skagway River and theWhite Pass trail for most of the journey toWhite Pass summit. The White Pass trail or‘Trail of 98’ as its also known was the routemost Stampeders (Gold seekers) took toreach Lake Bennett before sailing the last

Andrew Jones andPhilip Wormald travelacross the Canada/USborder on the scenicnarrow gauge WhitePass and YukonRailway and discover aland of glaciers, bearsand ALCo locomotives.Text by Andrew Jones,illustrations by PhilipWormald

White PassWhite PassYukon RailwayYukon Railway

TheThe

– The railway built of gold– The railway built of goldandand

ABOVE: Triple 90 class GEs Nos. 100, 93 and98 wait at Skagway on 14 June withcarriages to form ‘Summit’ train No. 37.Low clouds are often a part of the morningscene at Skagway. The resident populationof 850 people rises to over 8,000 on a busysummer day.

▼

66 Railways Illustrated October 2005

500 miles to Dawson City, centre of theYukon Gold Rush, in makeshift boats. Thistortuous trail was difficult enough toascend in the summer, but with theincredibly harsh winters and the ton ofsupplies demanded by the Canadiancustoms to allow entry, the trip must havetested every Stampeder to the limit, it wasobvious a railway needed to be built.

Two men with that vision arrived in

Skagway; London based investor SirThomas Tancrede and Canadian Railroadengineer Michael Heany met by chance in aSkagway hotel, talked through the nightand the following morning agreed a deal tobuild this ‘impossible’ railway.

Construction started on 28 May 1898 andin just two months trains startedtransporting Stampeders the first four milestowards the summit. It took until 20February 1899 to reach White Pass summit,delving through dense pine forests,crossing four rivers, through one tunneland hanging precariously on to steep cliffs.Once over the summit construction wasmuch easier and Lake Bennett was reachedon 6 July 6 1899, track laying also startedsouthbound from Whitehorse and the twosections met at Carcross for the GoldenSpike ceremony.

The whole railway cost $10 million tobuild and by the opening date it hadalready paid for itself in fares from theStampeders to carry them and theirbelongings northward to the gold.

Once the gold rush was over the railwaymade its money from mining, bringing theore and concentrates from the Yukon toSkagway docks for export. During WorldWar 2 the route was taken over by the USarmy to transport materials in connectionwith the building of the Alaska-Canada(Alcan) Highway. Around this time theoriginal route, which went along BroadwayStreet in Skagway was realigned along theeastern edge of town.

The Container routeDuring the mid 1950s the first dieselsarrived on the route and in 1964 steamoperation came to an end, by this time therailroad had developed a ship/train/truckcontainer service, the first in the world andoperated its own 6,000 ton container ship.These trains were the railways bread andbutter right to the end of freight operation.

When heavier diesels arrived in 1969 the

ABOVE: DL535Es Nos. 101, 108 and 104 areseen on train No. 42 from the small halt ofGlacier as they descend the steep gradebetween Inspiration Point and SlipperyRock on 11 June. All movements arecontrolled by a dispatcher at Skagway andthe successive trains run at eight minuteintervals, between the various block posts.

LEFT: Bombardier-built wide cab No. 114 isseen leading DL535E No. 108 at Denver on17 June with a long work train fromSkagway to Fraser. No. 114 is the only locoremaining in the old blue livery and isgenerally used as a standby loco and worksengineers trains.

▼

October 2005 Railways Illustrated 67

huge cantilever bridge at Gulch, 18 milesfrom Skagway, the highest cantilever bridgein the world when built, needed to bereplaced. A new steel bridge was built tothe north necessitating the building of atunnel at the north end of the new bridgeto rejoin with the original alignment at milepost 19.

Shortly after the arrival of these newdiesels the wooden roundhouse at Skagwayburnt down on 15 October 1969 destroyingtwo of the brand new locos and two‘Plymouth’ switchers.

Operations were suspended in theautumn of 1982. The new Klondikehighway, the only road into Skagway,opened in 1979 and reduced freight trafficconsiderably. The final nail in the coffinwas the closure of the Yukon miningindustry as a result of a catastrophic fall inworld mineral prices.

The route reopened in 1988 as a summeronly tourist operation serving thethousands of day trippers from thenumerous cruise ship arrivals in SkagwayDocks, from then the line has gone fromstrength to strength.

The locomotives androlling stock

The backbone of the fleet today are the 90class General Electric ‘Shovelnoses’, built inbatches between 1954 and 1966, these 11930-980hp stalwarts have battled againstthe weather and terrain for over 50 years.Before 1982, when the railroad operated all

year round, they fought against 35ftsnowdrifts and temperatures as low as -30C, these days’ temperatures of up to 30Cin summer test their cooling fans to thelimit.

These custom built locos are well suitedto the job; the cab is designed for buckingsnow and high radiator air intakesallow cooling in high snow drifts, therock solid six-cylinder Alco 251power units have served them wellover the years. Two batches of similarlocomotives were built for the highAndean routes in Argentina and afew remain in service there, thesemachines are the true Kings of themountains. Number 96 has recentlybeen resurrected from a virtuallyderelict condition; the loco had beenout of use since the late 1970s andrequired a total internal rebuild.

In 1969 Alco started construction ofseven DL-535 road switchers for theWhite Pass; these units werecompleted by the MontrealLocomotive Works (MLW) when Alcoclosed shortly after fabricating theframes for the first three.Incorporating an updated version ofsix-cylinder 251 power unit, thesemachines produce 1,200hp. The 101class were delivered in September1969, two of them (Nos. 102 and 105)were completely written off a monthlater in the roundhouse firementioned earlier, and their remainswere cut up in 1992.

Three more locomotives of thesame design were ordered from MLWto replace the two destroyed units;Nos. 108-110 which arrived in 1971.

After the White Pass had resumedoperations, traffic levels were easilyhandled by the GEs so the decisionwas made to sell some of the 101class. In 1992 five locos, Nos. 101, 103,104, 106 and 107 were sold to STF inColombia leaving Skagway for SantaMarta by ship.

Traffic levels in the years followingtheir departure grew to such a degreethat more locos were then needed;the WP&YR negotiated with STF andbought the five locos back, theyretraced their sea journey arrivingback in Skagway on 30 July 1999. Oneloco nearly did not make ithowever, and almost ended up in

ABOVE: GEs Nos. 91, 97 and 90 waitdeparture at Fraser with train No. 24 toSkagway on 9 June. Driver John Westfall isthe regular driver on the two daily Frasertrains and these are his ‘preferred’locomotives! So expect to see these threeGEs on this train on a regular basis.

▼

68 Railways Illustrated October 2005

the depths of Skagway dock after it wasleft hanging precariously over the edge ofthe boat while being unloaded. Four of thefive locos were put back into service butNo. 103, which has a damaged power unitremains out of use, however it will beoverhauled and returned to service whentime allows.

The final diesel in the fleet is No. 114, thefourth loco of an order placed in 1982before the railway closed. These units werebuilt by Bombardier, successors to MLWwith the same power unit as the 101 class,but with ac rectified control giving a highertractive effort. By the time the fourlocomotives were built the White Pass had

closed, two Nos. 112 and 113 were sold toUS Gypsum for their three foot operation atPlaster City in California, No. 113 wasdestroyed in an accident and No. 111 waspurchased to replace it leaving No. 114languishing in Montreal for 13 years beforeWhite Pass eventually bought it. It remainsin the blue livery as built, the road coloursof the White Pass in 1982.

This loco is generally used only forworks trains and rarely appears onpassenger excursions, this is due to anuntraceable fault with the locos dynamicbrake system only allowing it to operate atmaximum dynamics with no variation.

The pride of the fleet is No. 73, a 1947-built Baldwin 2-8-0 Mikado, convertedfrom coal to oil burning in the 1950s, thismachine is kept in immaculate condition atSkagway shops for its weekly trip to Frasereach Saturdays. It is kept in steam most ofthe time and often performs shuntingduties around Skagway docks; ‘73’ usuallytakes around five coaches up the hill to thesummit and on to Fraser.

A new addition to the fleet is expectedthis summer, No. 69 has been in Wisconsinat the moment for a complete overhaul.Built in 1907 by Baldwin, this 2-8-0 was thebiggest steam loco to operate on the WhitePass route. No. 69 was named Gila Monsterby the US army in WW2 and converted toan oil burner in 1951. The loco left theWP&YR in 1956, sold to the Black Hills

Central Railway in South Dakota where itwas renamed Klondike Casey. In 1973 itbecame Nebraska Midland No. 69 where itserved until 1990. The White Pass boughtthe loco back in 2001 and sent it to theMidwest loco works for overhaul. So thewell travelled ‘69’ will be soon headinghome for the first time in 49 years.

A total of 69 parlour cars, either built forthe White Pass or obtained from variousnarrow gauge railroads in the US ply theroute. All are named after a local river orlake and were built between 1889 and 2005.These, and various flatbeds, tank wagons,cabooses and a number of permanant-waytrolleys make up the rolling stock fleet.

All the locomotives and rolling stock aremaintained to a high standard in therailroads repair shops on the outskirts ofSkagway. The locos are given a fearfulhammering day-in day-out climbing thepass, and the motors are worked constantlydescending using the dynamic brakes, atestament to the solid GE electrics and Alcopower units.

ABOVE: Baldwin steam loco No. 73descends through Glacier with train No.WX73 on 11 June. This train was an extra‘Summit’ train which ran via the Fraserloop. The loco is usually in steam duringthe busy summer season and is often usedas the Skagway pilot.

BELOW: No fewer than four GEs Nos. 94, 96,99 and 92 lead ‘Summit’ train No. 41 pastDenver with a 15 coach load. All the‘Summit’ trains originate in one of thedocks at Skagway and have direct accessto the relevant cruise ships that are intown on any given day.

ABOVE: Triple DL535E, Nos. 101, 109 and110 built by ALCo/MLW, arrive at WhitePass on 17 June with train ‘Summit’ No.31. Fridays are quieter days, so on theseoccasions train No. 31 reverses at WhitePass and returns to Skagway as train No.32, rather than running via Fraser loop asit does on busy days.

▼

October 2005 Railways Illustrated 69

The Route TodayIn 2004 over 400,000 people rode on the

White Pass and Yukon, records are brokeneach year necessitating more and morecoaches to be ordered to meet the everincreasing numbers of cruise passengersand independent hikers.

Monday to Thursday are usually therailways busiest days with four cruiseliners arriving in the docks offloading some8,000 day trippers in this small town ofonly 842 residents. After the line has beenchecked by the permanent way trolley thefirst departures of the day can getunderway.

All movements are radio controlled bythe dispatcher at Skagway and trains areseparated by numerous block posts alongthe line. Trains can load up to 24 coachesand are generally hauled by three or fourlocos (usually of the same type) in multiplewith the diesel run to Bennett usually beinga single 90 class; the 101s and 114 are

seldom used beyond White Pass due to aheavier axle weight.

The first passenger train is the 08.08 toFraser BC, this leaves from the Main stationand is met at Fraser by a coach connectionto/from Whitehorse. Four ‘Summitexcursion’ trains follow the Fraser train ataround 10 minute intervals, the first goesbeyond the summit to Fraser Loop (a largeturning circle), just before the station (thistrain can run out and back from Skagwaywithout actually stopping) to avoid a run

round and leave room at White Pass for theother three summit trains to arrive. Asthere is only the main line and one passingloop at White Pass, the following threetrains perform a complicated shuntmanoeuvre.

The second ‘summit excursion’ runsround at the White Pass and reverses northonto the single line to clear the loop for thethird train to arrive and run round; whenthis is done, the final train can enter thesummit loop. Once the forth is in clear,

RIGHT: Sunday afternoon rush at WhitePass on 12 June as two southbound trainsprepare to return to Skagway. Nos. 92, 110,109 and 101 lead train No. 42 formed of 21vehicles, and Nos. 98, 106, 108 and 104 leadtrain No. 44 formed of 20 vehicles. This isthe physical US/Canadian border, althoughcustoms facilities are not located here dueto very harsh winter weather conditions.

▼

70 Railways Illustrated October 2005

the second summit excursion can departon the main line to Skagway, the third canreverse north, wait for the last summit trainto run round, and then depart. Finally theforth can follow south once the previoustrain has cleared the block post at AmericanShed.

The Fraser Loop train follows these andthe returning Fraser brings up the rear.

This is repeated in the afternoon with theFraser train leaving Skagway at 12.30, oncethey are all back in Skagway two summittrains run ‘as required’ in the evening, at16.30 and 16.40 depending on passengernumbers.

Fridays to Sundays are less busy with theFraser train and only two or three summitexcursions. On Fridays and Sundays a trainconnects at Fraser for Bennett, a further 13miles northward to the shores of Lake

Bennett to collect hikers from the Chilkoottrail. The Chilkoot train was the alternativeroute for the Stampeders, shorter but muchsteeper than the White Pass route, this trainstarts from Skagway on Saturdays withsteam loco No. 73 at the head.

There are five stations in Skagway; theDepot is the main base for the railway andhome to the offices and the dispatcher,trains also depart from the Long Siding,Railroad Dock, Broadway Dock and OreDock to allow easy access from the cruiseliners. It is worth mentioning that Skagwayis the 17th most popular cruise destinationin the World!

Moves are underway for running as faras Carcross in the Yukon Territory, trackwork is ongoing and services should startsoon. Carcross is 67 miles from Skagwayand apart from the level crossing at LogCabin, five miles north of Fraser, is the nextplace with road access so maybe the Frasertrain will continue to Carcross forthe bus connection to Whitehorse.There are no plans to run through toWhitehorse in the foreseeable future.

The line has to rank as one of themost scenic railways in the world,the run from Skagway to White Passsummit is exhilarating and the viewsare stunning. Bears, mountain goats,caribou, eagles and porcupine areregularly seen from the train. These,combined with waterfalls, glaciers,raging rivers, pine forests and plentyof history make for an unforgettabletrip. The views climbing towardGlacier station of the train in fronthundreds of feet above you on the

other side of the valley are breathtaking asis the Carmack glacier and Bridal VeilFalls crashing 6,000 ft down themountainside from it. The best vista of allis from the aptly named Inspiration Pointback along the valley flanked on eitherside by snow-capped peaks to the cruiseliners in Skagway dock, 17 miles by railaway.

Multiple journey ‘rover’ tickets areavailable by contacting Cody Bricker(cbricker@whitepass.net) at the WhitePass and Yukon Route Railway directly. ■

Special thanks are due to Beth Cline, CodyBricker, Gary Danielson and all the staff onthe WPYR for their assistance in preparingthis article and on our trip there, specialthanks to the ‘three Johns’ McDermott,Westfall and Briner, also thanks to theWP&YR Yahoo! group for answering myquestions.

FACT FILE

Location: Skagway, AlaskaLand Area: 454 sq. milesWater Area: 11 sq. milesPopulation: 842 (in winter)!Main physical features: Rugged mountains andbroad river valleys in AlaskaClimate: Maritime climate with cool summers andmild winters.Time difference: – 9 hoursAccommodation: Various hotels and bed &breakfast (see links below)Reaching Skagway: Air Canada or Condor (fromFrankfurt) to WhitehorseVisa requirements: Visa waiver scheme for mostUK passport holdersCurrency: US Dollars

Web sites to check out:White Pass & Yukon Railway:http://www.wpyr.com/ WPYR webcam:http://www.wpyr.com/multimedia/webcam.htmlWhitepass Fanlist:http://groups.yahoo.com/group/whitepassfanlist/Boerries Burkhardt site:http://www.whitepassfan.net/Skagway info:http://www.skagway.com/http://www.everythingalaska.com/eta.skwl.htmlhttp://www.skagwaychamber.org/community.htmlHotel and accommodation:http://www.skagway.com/accommodations.html

ABOVE: Northbound train No. 41 exits theloop at Fraser as southbound train No. 46with GEs Nos. 98, 93 and 100 leading on itsreturn to Skagway on 16 June. Normallythis train operates anti clockwise aroundthis loop, special thanks to local staff forrunning clockwise to allow this photo tobe taken.

BELOW: GEs Nos. 99, 96 and 94 on train No.64 wait at White Pass for orders from thedispatcher to continue southbound on 12June. On Sundays, the normally smallBennett trains Nos. 63 and 64 arestrengthened as far as Fraser due to theusually large number of bookings.

▼