Oregon Secretary of State

Transportation Ghost Towns

A rusted old tractor sits in a field with weeds and grass growing about knee high. Other scrap metal lies to the left in back.
An old tractor in Shaniko. (Oregon State Archives, 2019)
Get a high resolution copy of this image from the Oregon Scenic Images Collection​.
Location, location, location are said to be the top three factors in the real estate market. This cliché could be true in the making of ghost towns too. Towns often boomed because of some transportation location advantage only to die off when railroad or highway routes later ​bypassed the area. Isolated communities along highways also could be dangerous places as the story of a murder in Millican proves.

Railroads

Highways and Canals

Millican

Shaniko