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Show si loSlroeicl proposal hints I j off Icte 1800 promises "As mentioned in the Express several times this past winter, the Union Pacific people propose to make an effort to traffic to Ashley Valley," Vernal Express May 21, 1896. Since that winter of 1896 headlines of a railraod servicing the Ashley garnished garnish-ed the Express in one form or another. The closest the. Valley ever came to having a railroad was the narrow gauge line from Mack, Colo., to Dragon, Utah in 1903 and Watson in 1911, to haul gilsonite. This line was used until 1939 and old rail ties and spikes can still be found around the remains of Indigo near the White River. With the announcement from Western Fuels Ut. Inc., which will supply supp-ly coal to the Moon Lake Project, a 35-mile railroad costing an estimated $80,000,000 is going to be built from northeast nor-theast of Rangely to northwest of Bonanza. This system would be used to haul coal from Colorado to the Moon Lake power plant site seven miles north of Bonanza. Western Fuels proposes to build their railroad in two years, and to finish by the end of 1983. What would make a railroad even more feasible is it could have a two-way haul. The oil, gas, phosphate, gilsonite, a oil shale by-products could ber. i of the area and then the coal, ,, material and equipment could K to the area on the same tracks ' Maybe with all the talk ; development impact in the set, is and county, maybe just m: 11 statement in Oct. 8, 1896Expr$ il truer than we think ! "and Uintah County with It (' natural resources will bloomas: ' in the near future." " Truly a railroad wouldbeasi; ' right direction, but seeing it : ( would surely loosen the pen. , a |