Athol – Athol Junction railway line
The railway Athol Athol Junction (also Athol Branch ) is a railway line in Massachusetts ( United States ). It is 73 kilometers long and connects the cities of Springfield , Palmer and Athol , among others . The standard-gauge line has largely been closed, only the approximately six kilometers of the route from Athol Junction to shortly before Indian Orchard are still used by CSX Transportation to connect a power station and various other industrial connections. About 20 kilometers of the route were flooded by the Quabbin Reservoir in the 1930s .
history
In 1869 local investors founded the Athol and Enfield Railroad Company with the financial support of the communities along the projected route with the aim of building a railway line from Athol southwards along the Swift River . It should lead to the main route of the New London Northern Railroad north of Palmer. In June 1870 construction began and in October 1871 the planned route from Athol to Barretts Junction went into operation. The railway company wanted to extend the route to Springfield, renamed itself in 1872 to Springfield, Athol and Northeastern Railroad Company and opened the remaining section to Athol Junction on December 3, 1873. The approximately three and a half kilometers from Athol Junction to Springfield were through a Shared right of use for the main line of the Boston and Albany Railroad bridged. The company initially operated the route on its own account, but with the opening of the entire route, it transferred the management of the route to the Fitchburg Railroad that followed in Athol .
Due to the expensive construction of the railway, the railway company was dependent on income, which, however, was largely absent, since passing express trains were not routed over the winding and single-track route. The planned takeover by Fitchburg Railroad did not take place either, as this company showed no interest in buying the route. In May 1879 the railway company filed for bankruptcy and was reorganized as Springfield and Northeastern Railroad . The operating contract with Fitchburg was canceled and the railway company now ran operations on its own again. To prevent their competitors, namely the Fitchburg Railroad and the Central Massachusetts Railroad , from being able to reach the Springfield route, Boston & Albany bought the line on July 8, 1880 and operated it from then on as a branch line.
In the 1920s, planning began for a large dam on the Swift River, in whose valley the railway lay. Construction on this dam began in 1930 and plans were drawn up to move the railroad to higher ground. However, due to the global economic crisis and increasing individual traffic, the railway had become unprofitable. Instead of moving it, the Boston & Albany asked for the closure of the section from Athol to Bondsville affected by the flooding. In June 1935, passenger traffic on the entire route ended, while the northern section was closed, most of which disappeared under the surface of the Quabbin Reservoir in the following years .
After a hurricane on September 21, 1938, which partially destroyed the route between Ludlow and Barretts Junction, the Boston & Albany also closed this section, officially this took place in 1939. They sold the short section from Barretts Junction to Bondsville to the Central Vermont Railroad , which operated the main line crossing at Barrett's Junction. In the 1950s, this section of the line was closed after the attached factories in Bondsville were closed.
The operator of the rest of the route from Ludlow to Athol Junction changed several times. After Boston & Albany had increasingly lost their independence as a subsidiary of the New York Central Railroad (NYC) in the 1950s, NYC took over management of the network. After a merger, the operator was called Penn Central from 1968 and Conrail from 1976 . This company closed the section between Ludlow and Indian Orchard in 1982. The remaining six kilometers have been operated since 1998 by CSX Transportation , which had acquired part of the Conrail network.
Route description
The route begins at Athol station on the former Fitchburg Railroad. It was therefore referred to as the Athol Union Station until 1935 . The disused route leads west out of the station and then turns south. Until Bondsville, the route ran along the Swift River through sparsely populated area. After the construction of the Quabbin Dam, the places Dana, Greenwich and Enfield, which had been connected by the railway, were flooded. At the dam, the railway line comes to the surface again and now runs further south through West Ware.
In the Bondsville district of the city of Palmer, the route reaches the Chicopee River , where it continues along. It initially runs north of the river. In this area the railway line crosses several partly disused railway lines, namely the main line of the former Central Massachusetts Railroad, the main line of the New England Central Railroad which is in operation and the route of the never opened Hampden Railroad . After Ludlow, the railway crosses the Chicopee River and reaches the urban area of Springfield. The river bridge was demolished after it was closed. The tracks begin today on the site of the Masspower power station and freight trains will use the route from here to the confluence with the Boston & Albany main line at the Athol Junction junction .
passenger traffic
Shortly after the takeover by Boston & Albany in 1881, two working pairs of trains from Athol to Springfield ran in 1881, one of which ran as a mixed train , which was retained until passenger traffic was discontinued in 1935. A few years later, an additional pair of trains was added on Saturdays between Springfield and Bondsville, which was canceled around 1908. Instead, from around 1911 onwards, a pair of trains ran every Sunday on the entire route, which was discontinued in 1930 or 1931. The travel time for the entire route from Athol to Springfield in 1934 was just under two hours for normal passenger trains and two and a half to three hours for mixed trains.
Sources and further reading
- Individual evidence
- ↑ see timetables of the route from the years mentioned.
- literature
- Ronald D. Karr: The Rail Lines of Southern New England. A Handbook of Railroad History. Branch Line Press, Pepperell, MA 1995. ISBN 0-942147-02-2
- Mike Walker: Comprehensive Railroad Atlas of North America. New England & Maritime Canada. (2nd edition) SPV-Verlag, Dunkirk (GB), 2010. ISBN 1-874745-12-9