Echo & Park City Railway (1881-1898)

This page was last updated on October 4, 2009.

Additional Information:

Corporate Information — Information about the corporate organization
UP's Park City Branch — Information about Echo & Park City Railway that was included in the article "From Echo To Park City"

January 17, 1881:
Echo & Park City Railroad was organized by Union Pacific interests to buy, own, and operate the railroad property formerly known as the Summit County Rail Road.

March 1881:
Echo & Park City completed a depot at Park City. (Salt Lake Herald, March 3, 1881)

May 6, 1881:
Sidney Dillon sold the property and interests of the Summit County Railroad to the Echo & Park City Railway for $1,006,600 in stocks and bonds of the E&PC company. (Arrington: Coal Road, p. 55)

(UP corporate history shows July 1 as the date of purchase.)

(ICC Valuation, 44 Val Rep 193, shows July 1 as the date that Union Pacific took control of the Echo & Park City Railway.)

1883:
Echo & Park City extended its line into Park City, 1.04 miles beyond end of track at Mile Post 27.27. (UP corporate history)

(By examination of the ICC valuation map of 1923 (prior to the Echo Reservoir relocation) Mile Post 27.27 is about a half mile east of the wye where the tracks turned south towards Park City. The extension took the tracks up to the foot of Main Street, where a depot was built. The depot still stands at the northern, lower end of Main Street. It suffered some fire damage but the damage was repaired by the private individual who owns it.)

1887:
Echo & Park City abandoned and removed the track of the 3.94-mile Grass Creek Branch, up Grass Creek canyon to the Church Coal Mine. (UP corporate history)

(The Grass Creek Branch was removed because the church-owned coal mine that it served was closed after being confiscated by the federal government, in the government's anti-polygamy moves against the LDS church under provisions of the Edmunds-Tucker Act of 1887.)

May 18, 1887:
Echo & Park City purchased the property of the abandoned Utah Eastern, from the trustee Edward Dickinson. Dickinson purchased the Utah Eastern under foreclosure on April 30, 1887. (UP corporate history)

(The Park Record of February 26 said that on February 21, 1887 the Utah Eastern was sold to P. L. Williams, Union Pacific's Western Division attorney.)

July 9, 1887:
Union Pacific moved its Wanship depot (on the Echo & Park City line) to Wahsatch, to replace the Wahsatch depot that burned on June 18. (Park Record, June 18, 1887; July 9, 1887)

October 13, 1893:
Echo & Park City Railway entered receivership at the same time as Union Pacific Railway. (Union Pacific ICC Corporate History)

September 19, 1894:
The Grass Creek Terminal Railway was incorporated to construct a branch from the Echo & Park City line, about three miles north of Coalville, to the Grass Creek coal mine located in Grass Creek canyon. The company built 2.87 miles of line on the grade and alignment of Echo & Park City's original Grass Creek branch, along with an additional 2.7 miles of new construction. The entire 5.59-mile line was owned by private individuals who were also leaders of the LDS church, which owned the coal mine. The line was constructed in 1895-96 by Union Pacific forces and upon completion it was operated by the E&PC, and later by the Union Pacific, as the Grass Creek Branch. (UP corporate history) In July 1907 David Eccles purchased the 1,040 acres of coal lands that comprised the Grass Creek coal mine and organized the Grass Creek Coal Company of Utah. (Salt Lake Mining Review, November 15, 1907, p. 38; Arrington: Eccles p. 122) The purchase of the Grass Creek coal lands also included the Grass Creek Terminal Railway. (Salt Lake Mining Review, July 15, 1907, p. 33) By early 1910 the coal mines in the Coalville area included the Weber Coal Company, the Union Fuel Company, and the Rees Grass Creek Company. (Salt Lake Mining Review, January 30, 1910, p. 29)

April 15, 1898:
Echo & Park City Railway entered its own receivership, separate from Union Pacific's receivership. (Union Pacific ICC Corporate History)

December 30, 1899:
Echo & Park City Railway was sold to the newly organized Union Pacific Railroad. The sale took effect on December 31, 1899. (Union Pacific ICC Corporate History)

Locomotives

Echo & Park City is not known to have operated with its own locomotives.

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