Manchester – Lawrence railway line

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Manchester NH – Lawrence MA, as of 1999
Society: PAR
Route length: 43.89 km
Gauge : 1435 mm ( standard gauge )
Tracks: 1
Legend
Route - straight ahead
 by Concord
Station without passenger traffic
 0.00 Manchester NH
   
 to Nashua
   
 after Candia
   
 ? Nutts Pond NH
   
 5.99 Manchester-Boston Regional Airport
   
 (formerly Willey, Grenier AFB)
   
 9.82 Londonderry NH
   
 12.72 Wilson NH (formerly Wilsons)
   
 18.04 Derry NH
   
 Connection to the Chester – Derry tram
   
 23.13 Windham NH (formerly Windham Junction)
   
 Worcester – Rochester
   
 29.66 Canobie Lake NH
   
 32.58 Salem NH
   
 Siding Rockingham Park
   
 37.65 Hampshire Road (formerly Messers)
   
38.08
5.81
Beginning of Methuen Branch (MA / NH border)
   
 4.04 Methuen MA
   
 1.26 North Lawrence MA (formerly Essex Street)
   
 Merrimack River
   
 from Agamenticus
Station without passenger traffic
 0.00 South Lawrence MA
Route - straight ahead
 after Wilmington and Lowell

The Manchester – Lawrence railway is a rail link between Massachusetts and New Hampshire ( United States ). It is almost 44 kilometers long and connects the cities of Manchester and Lawrence . Most of the line, namely the Manchester – Salem section, has been closed and dismantled. The remaining section belongs to Pan Am Railways but is out of service.

history

The Manchester and Lawrence Railroad (M&L), founded in 1847, had received a concession to build and operate a railway between its eponymous cities, but only from the state of New Hampshire. The approximately 44 km long, standard-gauge line went into operation for passenger traffic on November 13, 1849, and freight traffic was opened on January 1, 1850. The Boston and Maine Railroad built the 5.81 km long section in Massachusetts . When operations opened, M&L leased this section of the route, which was run by Boston & Maine as the Northern Branch and from around 1869 as the Methuen Branch .

From 1887, Boston & Maine ran operations on the branch line. In 1935 she built a siding to the Rockingham Park racecourse in Salem , which was used by special trains at racing events until 1960 and was only dismantled around 1999. Regular passenger traffic between Manchester and Lawrence ended in July 1953 after only one gas-electric multiple unit ran once in each direction on weekdays.

When Guilford Transportation took over management in 1983 , since 2006 under the name Pan Am Railways , the middle section between Salem and Derry was closed. The Derry – Londonderry section followed three years later. After the only customer on the northern part of the route had ceased to exist in November 1998 , the tracks through the city of Manchester were removed in the area of ​​the former Grenier Air Force Base , which was to be expanded into a commercial airport, and the route was built over with a new runway. The Manchester – Londonderry section was not officially closed until 2000. The Lawrence – Salem section has not been officially closed, but has been out of service since the 1980s and is no longer navigable.

passenger traffic

The timetable of September 28, 1913 provided for six pairs of passenger trains on workdays and four on Sundays. The travel time was 53 to 68 minutes. All trains on the route were connected to and from Boston in Lawrence.

In the timetable of January 15, 1934, there were only three working days and one Sunday train pair as well as one working day early train from Methuen to Lawrence. There were also buses that also stopped in Wilson, but passed Windham without stopping. The travel time by train was between 62 and 68 minutes, the buses took 73 minutes.

Route description

The line begins in Manchester, where it branches off the Nashua – Concord railway to the southeast. The entire route has relatively few bends. South of the city, one of the airport runways now crosses the former railway line. After the route has passed the airport premises, it first turns to the east in order to resume the south-east course after passing under Interstate 93 . The line continues through Derry to Windham , where the Worcester – Rochester railway crossed at the same level from 1874 to 1935 . The route then crosses the city of Salem and passes the Rockingham Park racecourse , which is now connected to a shopping center. Shortly after crossing the Hampshire Road, the state border to Massachusetts is reached, which also represented the property line between the Manchester & Lawrence and the Boston & Maine until the entire route was taken over by the Boston & Maine. Through Methuen , the line then reaches the town of Lawrence , where it first crosses the Merrimack River and then joins the Wilmington – Agamenticus railway line in a triangular track .

Sources and further information

Individual evidence
  1. ↑ Mike Walker: Comprehensive Railroad Atlas of North America. New England & Maritime Canada. SPV-Verlag, Dunkirk (GB), 1999.
  2. ↑ Distance kilometers from http://www.trainweb.org/nhrra/Mileage-Charts/BM-RR/Manchester-Lawrence.htm
  3. ↑ Official Guide of the Railways and Steam Navigation Lines of the United States, Porto Rico, Canada, Mexico and Cuba. Issued November 1913. Boston & Maine Railroad, Table 45. page 195.
  4. ↑ Official Guide of the Railways and Steam Navigation Lines of the United States, Porto Rico, Canada, Mexico and Cuba. Issued February 1934. Boston & Maine Railroad, Table 35. Page 80.
literature
  • Robert M. Lindsell: The Rail Lines of Northern New England. Branch Line Press, Pepperell, MA 2000, ISBN 0-942147-06-5 .
Web links