The Dunvegan Yards were rail yards in Edmonton, Alberta, named after, and originally owned by, the Edmonton, Dunvegan and British Columbia Railway. Located just east of the St. Albert Trail and connected to the Grand Trunk Pacific's transcontinental mainline, the yards were the southern terminus of the ED&BC which began construction in 1912, [1] though the yards were not officially surveyed until 1914. The ED&BC, by 1915, reached Grande Prairie in the Peace Country some 400 miles or 640 kilometres northwest from Edmonton, and helped to cement Edmonton as a major Canadian rail hub, opened up the Westlock region to increased settlement, [2] linked northern Alberta economically to the rest of the continent, and earned Edmonton a reputation as "the Gateway to the North".
A rail yard, railway yard or railroad yard is a complex series of railroad tracks for storing, sorting, or loading and unloading, railroad cars and locomotives. Railroad yards have many tracks in parallel for keeping rolling stock stored off the mainline, so that they do not obstruct the flow of traffic. Railroad cars are moved around by specially designed yard switchers, a type of locomotive. Cars in a railroad yard may be sorted by numerous categories, including railroad company, loaded or unloaded, destination, car type, or whether they need repairs. Railroad yards are normally built where there is a need to store cars while they are not being loaded or unloaded, or are waiting to be assembled into trains. Large yards may have a tower to control operations.
Edmonton is the capital city of the Canadian province of Alberta. Edmonton is on the North Saskatchewan River and is the centre of the Edmonton Metropolitan Region, which is surrounded by Alberta's central region. The city anchors the north end of what Statistics Canada defines as the "Calgary–Edmonton Corridor".
The Edmonton, Dunvegan and British Columbia Railway (ED&BC) was an early pioneer railway in northwestern Alberta, designed to open up the Peace River district.
The ED&BC was not an economic success, however, and was operated by the provincial government of Alberta on a lease after 1920, and was purchased outright by the government in 1925 and merged in the new government-owned Northern Alberta Railways in 1928. Shortly thereafter, the NAR was sold to the Canadian National Railway and Canadian Pacific Railway as co-owners. The NAR became a fixture in northern Alberta for the next several decades, and the Dunvegan Yards were that railway's main hub and connection to the larger rail network. The also became a connector between the CN mainline and the CN-owned Great Slave Lake Railway in the far north of Alberta and southern Northwest Territories in 1964. In 1981, then government owned Canadian National bought out CP's share in the NAR and merged it into its network. The Dunvegan Yards were closed. At the time of the closure, the boundaries of the yard were
Northern Alberta Railways was a Canadian railway which served northern Alberta and northeastern British Columbia. Jointly owned by both Canadian National Railway and Canadian Pacific Railway, NAR existed as a separate company from 1929 until 1981.
The Mackenzie Northern Railway is a 602-mile (969 km) Canadian railway operating in Alberta and the Northwest Territories. It is the northernmost trackage of the contiguous North American railway network. Since being purchased by CN in 2006, it has been officially known as the Meander Subdivision.
starting on the east side of St. Albert Trail where it is crossed by the railway, north along the Trail to approximately 132 Avenue, then east parallel to 132 Avenue to Sir John Thompson Catholic Junior High School, then south around the school to approximately 127 Avenue and 135 Street, then west to the starting point.— [3]
Follow the closure the yards were redeveloped into a residential subdivision originally called "Dunvegan Gardens", and now more commonly called simply "Dunvegan", which is officially part of the neighbourhood of Athlone.
