With the drop in revenue, the Northern Pacific began to cut costs and defer maintenance on the line. The modern rotary snowplow that kept the line open in the winter was moved to other areas leading to long closures in the winter. The passenger cars went to the midwest for the Louisiana Purchase Exposition. When the roof on the turntable at Monte Cristo collapsed under heavy snow in 1904 it was never rebuilt. Rock slides in Robe Canyon caused outages almost every winter, and with the reduced traffic, the Northern Pacific saw less reason to repair the damage. The Monte Cristo line had become a problem for the Northern Pacific, just as it had for Rockefeller.