Re: Sumpter Valley Ry. Trucks

There was no easy way to get from Bates to Baker (City) by road. The Dooley Mountain road is very long, very steep and has probably more than a hundred very sharp curves. At that time it might not have been paved. I have followed log trucks over this road at 15 MPH. But I believe the route they chose was an unpaved National Forest road that was equally steep and curvy, and quite a bit of it was native surfaced, that is no gravel. Both routes were subject to heavy snow in the winter. The Forest Service does not try to keep their roads open in the winter, and I suspect Oregon Lumber Co. had to take care of plowing and maintenance when they were running.

The trucks were equipped with large Hall-Scott gasoline engines, which means they were very thirsty, and they never paid their way. To keep up with production they probably worked two ten hour shifts per day, which would add up to maybe 15 loads per day if everything went well. Note that each truck and trailer hauled the same load as a flat car. On the other hand the railroad could keep up making three round trips per week and was still operating in the black, though deferred maintenance might have made some of the difference. When they were shutting down F.M. Chandler, the railroad auditor, commented that there was nothing wrong with the railroad that 5000 new ties wouldn't fix. As the railroad cut and treated their own ties this would have been a minimal expense. Anyway, if the railroad had survived it probably would have only lasted another 12 to 15 years.