Norway – South Paris tram

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Norway – South Paris tram
Gauge : 1435 mm ( standard gauge )

The tram Norway - South Paris was a tram service in Maine ( United States ). On November 14, 1894, the Norway and Paris Street Railway Company was founded. On July 1, 1895, it opened a standard-gauge tram line between Norway and South Paris. The 800 meter long section between the level crossing and the terminus in South Paris could only be put into operation on August 22nd, as the operating license for this section was only then issued.

The 3.43 km long route followed Main Street in South Paris, as well as Paris Street and Main Street in Norway. The terminus in South Paris was near the market square in High Street, the one in Norway on Advertiser Square (Main Street / Pleasant Street). The two-track depot of the railway was in Norway on the north side of Main Street near the intersection of Marston Street. There were track crossings with the railroad in two places. The only way out of the single-track line was at the exhibition center near the city limits between Norway and South Paris. A few years after the line opened, a second turnout was built at South Paris station.

For normal operation at 30-minute intervals, one railcar was sufficient, which commuted between the terminals. Only during the Oxford County Fair in autumn, which was held annually on the exhibition grounds, did two or three cars run.

When the railway opened, the entire fleet consisted of two closed and two open railcars (no. 3 and 4 or 5 and 6). In the late autumn of 1895, a snow plow without its own drive was added, which was pushed by one of the railcars. The railway company later acquired used railcars from Washington, DC Shortly after the railway opened, an outside siding was built next to the vehicle hangar, which was covered in 1914 or 1915. The railway received its traction current from a railway's own generator, which was housed in a mixed steam and hydroelectric power station of the Norway Electric Light Company on Pennesseewasee Stream in Norway. In 1907 a similar generator was added to the Maine Power Company's newly built hydroelectric power station on the Little Androscoggin River in South Paris. In 1904, the railway company had also bought the legal successor to Norway Electric Light, the Oxford Light Company.

The railway was shut down on October 5, 1918 and dismantled in the summer of the following year.

literature

  • OR Cummings: Toonervilles of Maine. The Pine Tree State. Newburyport MA, 1955. Pages 40-48.
  • OR Cummings: The Norway and Paris Street Railway . In: Pine Tree Flyer , Volume 1, Number 4. Railroad Historical Society of Maine, Portland ME, 1982, pp. 6-8.
  • OR Cummings, Peter C. Hammond: Norway & Paris Street Railway. The Shortest Streetcar Line in The State of Maine 1895-1918. History and social aspects of a 2.13 mile streetcar line. Seashore Trolley Museum, 2008.

Individual evidence

  1. ^ OR Cummings, Peter C. Hammond: The Norway & Paris Street Railway. The Shortest Streetcar Line In The State of Maine, 1895-1918 . ( Cover picture ).
  2. ^ Poor's Manual of Railroads . 44th edition, 1911, p. 2068.
  3. ^ First Annual Report, Public Utilities Commission, State of Maine. Sentinel Publishing Co., Waterville ME 1915, p. 184.