Train line from Portland to Salt Lake City would bridge rural and urban gap, advocates say Free

PORTLAND— In November 2023, Baker City resident Matt Krabacher helped organize a petition pushing to restore a train line that would connect Portland and Salt Lake City.

By the following January, he had raised 1,500 signatures and presented it to the Oregon Legislature. Since then, he’s made it a goal to restore the train line that would connect his rural Oregon town with bigger cities.

The Pioneer was an Amtrak passenger train that operated from 1977 until 1997, when it was cut because of budget shortfalls. It spanned from Seattle to Denver, passing through the Oregon cities of Portland, The Dalles, Pendleton, Baker City and Ontario, as well as Boise and Salt Lake City.

While it hasn’t run for almost three decades, the Federal Railroad Administration in a January report to Congress