Southeast of Seattle and east of Tacoma, its importance to transportation lies almost entirely with railroading, as no paved roads cross it.

The tunnel opened for service in May 1888,[2] and is currently operated as the Stampede Subdivision by the NP's successor, BNSF Railway.

[3] Northern Pacific Railroad had been notified by the federal government that their lack of a direct route from Yakima to the Puget Sound was considered violation of their charter.

Faced with losing millions of acres in their land grant, they began earnestly exploring a route over the cascades.

Below is Bogue's report, written in January 1881, from the collection of Robert A. Robey, the Northern Pacific's roadmaster at Auburn, Washington, in charge of the line across Stampede Pass throughout the 1960s.

Bogue wrote the Washington State Historical Society's William Pierce Bonney about the naming of the pass in 1916.

Bonney, who worked for the Northern Pacific on Stampede Pass, added, "When the men quit work about the middle of the afternoon, the day of the stampede, they repaired to camp where they were busy waiting for supper; when the foreman came and announced to the cook that the food in his charge belonged to the railroad company was furnished to feed men that were working for the company, that these men had severed their connection with the company, hence were not entitled to be fed; then was when the real stampede began."

Bonney, Secretary, Washington State Historical Society, to 29th Annual Farmers Picnic, Enumclaw, 8-6-21.

According to A Brief History of the Northern Railway, a switchback with 5.6 percent grade was studied by Chief Engineer Anderson as early as 1884.

Trains took an hour and fifteen minutes to traverse the eight-mile-long (13 km) switchback, a brakeman riding the rooftops every two cars.

Andrew Gibson, born and educated in Scotland, began work for the NP on main line construction in Oregon, about eight miles (13 km) west of Portland, as a clerk for Mr. O. Phil, Assistant Engineer, about July 1, 1883, and continued in the same position until the party was disbanded, about the end of October.

Promoted to rodman about the beginning of June and to leveler about the middle of August, when the location of the 25 miles (40 km) from South Prairie to Eagle Gorge was completed.

Gibson went on to oversee the NP's building on the Palouse, the giant west end tie plant at Paradise, Montana, finally becoming the Chief Engineer in charge of maintenance of way in Saint Paul.

Between 1995 and 1996, BN and its successor BNSF Railway, rehabilitated the line as a response to increasing traffic pressures in the Pacific Northwest.

[11] A 2006 study by Cambridge Systematics for the Washington State Transportation Commission determined that the capacity of the Stampede Subdivision was sufficient or "reliable".