Brookport – Mattawamkeag railway line
The Brookport – Mattawamkeag railway is a railway line in the Canadian province of Quebec and Maine ( United States ). It is 462 kilometers long and was part of the main transcontinental route of the Canadian Pacific Railway . The standard gauge line is operated today between Brookport and Brownville Junction by the Central Maine and Quebec Railway in freight traffic. The Eastern Maine Railway operates freight between Brownville Junction and Mattawamkeag . Passenger traffic has not taken place on the route since 1994.
history
Prehistory and construction
The railway line was planned from the beginning as an eastern extension of the transcontinental railroad of the Canadian Pacific Railway (CP). The section of the line in Canada was built by the Atlantic and North West Railway , which opened the line from Lennoxville to Lac-Mégantic in 1883. On January 1, 1888, the first trains ran between Brookport and West Shefford. On June 1, 1888, the railway company bought the Waterloo – Sherbrooke line , for which a right of joint use had existed since 1886. At the same time, new sections were opened from West Shefford to South Stukely, where the line from Waterloo converged, and from Eastray to Magog. Shorter sections east of Eastray, around Mont Orford and at Magog were already part of the Waterloo route. The trains initially used the old route from Magog to Sherbrooke. On November 9, 1888, the new line from Magog to Lennoxville and a new station in Sherbrooke on the corner of Rue Belvédére and Rue Frontenac were opened.
The part in Maine was to be built by the Penobscot and Lake Megantic Railroad . This company was taken over in 1883 by the International Railway of Maine , which ultimately continued construction from Lac-Mégantic. In 1885 the line to the state border was completed. In the following year, the tracks reached Holeb , but the extension was not initially opened. At the end of 1886, Atlantic & North West took over International and a few weeks later CP, both railway companies. In mid-September 1888, the line from the state line to Greenville was put into operation. On June 2, 1889, the grand opening of the entire route took place. Initially, only a mixed train , the “Scoot”, ran on the route, which was to be in operation until 1968. It was not until 1893 that two express trains Montreal - St. John , some with through coaches to Halifax , were introduced.
Further development
In 1956 the "Atlantic Limited" ran for the first time between Montreal and St. John, replacing the previous express trains. The conversion to diesel operation did not begin until mid-1958 and was completed in 1960. The originally double-track line in sections was reduced to one track during this time. The “Scoot”, the only connection to the outside world for many communities along the route, ran as a mixed train between Brownville Junction and Holeb until 1968, then as a pure freight train. From September 29, 1978, VIA Rail Canada operated passenger services on the route and named the train "Atlantic". From June 1, 1982 to 1985, passenger traffic was discontinued. On December 17, 1994 the "Atlantic" operated for the last time. Since September 1, 1988, the route, like all CP routes east of Montreal, was taken over by the Canadian Atlantic Railway (CAR). At the end of 1994 the CAR applied for the line to be closed.
At the turn of the year 1995, CAR ceased operations. The section east of Brownville Junction was taken over by the Irving Company, a Canadian oil company, which has continued to operate it as the Eastern Maine Railway since then . The Brookport – Brownville Junction route was sold in March 1995 to Iron Road Railways , which commissioned the Canadian American Railroad , which was founded specifically for this purpose, to operate. After the bankruptcy of Iron Road Railways at the end of 2002, Rail World Inc. took over the entire facilities on January 9, 2003 and reorganized the company under the name Montreal, Maine and Atlantic Railway (MMA).
On July 6, 2013, a tank wagon train loaded with crude oil, parked at night in Nantes, started moving and rolled to Lac-Mégantic without a driver, where it derailed in a curve. The major fire resulting from the railway accident destroyed around 30 buildings in the city center. 47 people were killed. On December 18, 2013, goods traffic through Lac-Mégantic was resumed. However, due to the accident, MMA went bankrupt and was reorganized as Central Maine and Quebec Railway in 2014 .
Route description
The route is winding in an east-west direction through almost uninhabited land. Numerous river valleys are crossed on the way, as they mostly run in a north-south direction. Some major bridges had delayed the construction of the line east of Greenville. The largest bridge, the “Onawa Trestle”, is 366 meters long and 40 meters above the valley floor.
Sources and further information
- Individual evidence
- ↑ Mike Walker: Comprehensive Railroad Atlas of North America. New England & Maritime Canada. (2nd edition) SPV-Verlag, Dunkirk (GB), 2010.
- ↑ Trains Magazine (accessed December 24, 2013)
- literature
- George H. Drury: The Historical Guide to North American Railroads. 2nd edition. Kalmbach Publishing Co., Waukesha WI 2000, ISBN 0-89024-356-5
- Robert M. Lindsell: The Rail Lines of Northern New England. Branch Line Press, Pepperell, MA 2000, ISBN 0-942147-06-5 .
- Web links