Omnitrax HO Scale Models

OmniTRAX, Inc. is a Denver, Colorado-based transportation holding company incorporated in 1986 as a subsidiary of The Broe Group, a privately held real estate and energy development firm founded by Denver businessman Pat Broe in 1972. The company entered the railroad business that same year by acquiring the Great Western Railway of Colorado, a move intended to enhance the value of Broe Group's industrial real estate holdings in northeastern Colorado. From that modest beginning, OmniTRAX grew steadily through acquisitions and lease agreements to become one of the largest privately held railroad operators in the United States, eventually assembling a network of more than thirty regional and shortline railroads operating across roughly eighteen states and two Canadian provinces. The company's expansion accelerated through the 1990s as it took advantage of rail line divestitures by the major Class I carriers. OmniTRAX leased the Kansas Southwestern Railway from Union Pacific in April 1991 and later purchased approximately 800 miles of former Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe track in Kansas and Oklahoma in October 1992, forming the Central Kansas Railway to operate those lines. In June 1992 it acquired the Chicago West Pullman Transportation Co., gaining control of several industrial switching railroads in the Chicago area and elsewhere. The company made a significant move into Canada in November 1996 with the purchase of the Hudson Bay Railway, which connected The Pas, Manitoba, to the Port of Churchill, and followed that by acquiring the Carlton Trail Railway trackage from Canadian National roughly three months later. The 2000s brought further diversification as OmniTRAX purchased assets from North American RailNet, including the Georgia and Florida Railway and the Illinois Railway, while also establishing the Kettle Falls International Railway in Washington state using track purchased and leased from BNSF Railway beginning in January 2005. The company extended its reach into California in 2011 with the purchase of the Stockton Terminal and Eastern Railroad and continued adding shortline properties through the mid-2010s, including the Sand Springs Railway in Oklahoma and the Brownsville and Rio Grande International Railroad in Texas. By mid-decade OmniTRAX ranked as the third-largest shortline railroad company in the country, trailing only Genesee and Wyoming and Watco in scale. Beyond its railroad operations, OmniTRAX developed a broader role in transportation infrastructure by investing in ports, multimodal terminals, and industrial parks, often in conjunction with other Broe Group subsidiaries. Its 1997 acquisition of the Port of Churchill for the nominal sum of one Canadian dollar, accompanied by commitments from both the Canadian government and OmniTRAX itself to fund substantial improvements, illustrated the company's strategy of integrating rail with port and industrial development. The reporting mark OMLX reflects the company's leasing activities, through which it provides locomotives and rolling stock in support of its own subsidiary railroads and, at times, other operators within its network.