Overview | |
---|---|
Current operator | Amtrak CT Rail Connecticut Southern Railroad (freight) Pan Am Southern (overhead rights and Berlin-New Britain) CSX Transportation (overhead trackage rights) Providence and Worcester Railroad (Middletown only) |
Dates of operation | 1838–1872 |
Successor | New York, New Haven and Hartford Railroad |
Technical | |
Track gauge | 4 ft 8+1⁄2 in (1,435 mm) standard gauge |
Length | 62 miles (100 km) (main line) 79 miles (127 km) (including branches) |
The Hartford and New Haven Railroad (H&NH), chartered in 1833, was the first railroad built in the state of Connecticut and an important direct predecessor of the New York, New Haven and Hartford Railroad (the New Haven). The company was formed to connect the cities of New Haven, Connecticut, and Springfield, Massachusetts. It built northwards from New Haven, opening its first segment in 1838, and reaching Hartford in December 1839. The company reached Springfield in 1844 under the auspices of the Hartford and Springfield Railroad, a subsidiary chartered in Massachusetts. Branches were later built to Suffield, New Britain, and Middletown and operated by the Hartford and New Haven. The H&NH merged with the New York and New Haven Railroad in 1872, forming the New York, New Haven and Hartford Railroad.
The Hartford and New Haven Railroad's lines were merged into Penn Central Transportation Company with the rest of the bankrupt New Haven Railroad at the end of 1968; Penn Central itself went bankrupt and was merged into government-formed Conrail in 1976. At that time, Amtrak purchased the main line for passenger operations as its New Haven–Springfield Line, with Conrail handling freight operations and the various branches. Conrail sold its freight rights to the Connecticut Southern Railroad in 1996. Following track improvements and construction in the 2010s, in 2018 enhanced commuter rail service commenced, operated jointly by Amtrak and CT Rail.
The Hartford and New Haven Railroad of Connecticut was chartered in 1833 to build a railroad between Hartford and New Haven. [1] [2] It was one of the earliest railroads built in Connecticut, and was intended both to improve New Haven's access to the interior of the state, and to provide an alternative to ship transport along the Connecticut River, which froze during the winter. [1] Alexander Catlin Twining was commissioned to survey the railroad's route, originally intended to pass through Middletown, Connecticut. However, Twining decided during his survey that building through the hilly terrain around Middletown would be too difficult, and instead chose an alignment further west, via Meriden, Connecticut. [1] The citizens of Middletown were unhappy about being bypassed, but they would have to wait for more than a decade before a branch line reached their city. [1]
Construction started from New Haven in 1836, with a temporary halt caused by the Panic of 1837. The first portion of the line, from New Haven to Meriden, saw its first trains in December 1838, while the rest of the line to Hartford opened in December of the following year. [1] When the first portion of the line opened in December 1838, it was the first railroad to operate in the state of Connecticut. [3] With the railroad's two namesake cities now connected, the company turned its attention northward to Springfield, Massachusetts. In that city, the Hartford and New Haven would be able to connect with the Western Railroad, which was building its own line from Boston to Springfield. [1]
As the company's original charter only authorized a railroad between Hartford and New Haven, new charters from the states of Connecticut and Massachusetts were requested by the railroad company. On April 4, 1839, the Massachusetts legislature granted a charter for the Hartford and Springfield Railroad, which was authorized to build from the Connecticut border to Springfield. The new railroad company never operated independently, as it was simply a vehicle for the Hartford and New Haven to extend its line into Massachusetts. [4] Construction began in 1842, and the first trains between Hartford and Springfield ran at the end of 1844. The complete route was 62 miles (100 km) in length. [1]
In 1845, the Hartford and New Haven merged with the Hartford and Springfield Railroad to form the New Haven, Hartford and Springfield Railroad. [2] The company reverted back to the Hartford and New Haven Railroad name in 1847. [2]
The railroad was noted for the fast speed of its trains by 1848, when a Hartford and New Haven passenger train made the trip from Springfield to Hartford at an average speed of 50 miles per hour (80 km/h). The Hartford Weekly Times asserted that "This is the quickest trip ever made in this country with a heavy train over any railroad, and the road is now regularly run with greater speed than any other railroad in the United States, and with double the average velocity of railroads out of New England." [5] The railroad's largely straight alignment, which followed natural topography and the Connecticut River, made this possible. [5]
The Hartford and New Haven merged with the New York and New Haven Railroad in 1872, forming the New York, New Haven and Hartford Railroad (the New Haven). [2] [6] For the next 90 years, the route remained a vital passenger and freight route for the New Haven, with continuous passenger service even as most other lines in the region gradually had passenger service discontinued from the 1920s onward. [1]
The New Haven era came to an end in 1969, when the company was merged into the Penn Central Transportation Company. National passenger rail carrier Amtrak, formed in 1971, purchased the Hartford and New Haven route outright in 1976, becoming its New Haven–Springfield Line. Freight service passed to newly-formed Conrail that same year. [1]
From 1976 onwards, Amtrak maintained passenger service on the line, one of the few in the country it directly owned. Shuttle trains ran between New Haven and Springfield, and the line was also host to Amtrak's Bay State, a train between New York City and Boston via Springfield, as well as the Montrealer, travelling between New York City and Montreal. In the early 1990s, Amtrak elected to remove one of the two tracks on the line in a bid to reduce maintenance costs, a decision the company would come to regret in the 21st century when Connecticut and Massachusetts began a project to increase train service on the line. [1]
Conrail transferred its operations on the New Haven-Springfield line to shortline railroad startup Connecticut Southern Railroad in 1996. The new freight operator began to improve freight service on the line, reversing a general decline in business during Conrail's tenure. [1]
By the mid to late 2000s, Connecticut and Massachusetts were both advocating for improvements and expansion of commuter service on the line, at that point consisting solely of Amtrak's New Haven-Springfield Shuttle, offering six trains each direction daily. [1] Plans for expansion culminated in the Hartford Line, a joint project between both states to restore double track to the line and significantly increase passenger rail service. Construction on the project began in 2015, and it opened for service in 2018. [7] [8] After completion, service was increased to 29 trains a day, with 17 being a short turn between New Haven and Hartford. [8]
In total, four branches were built off of the main line by other companies, all of which were quickly acquired by the Hartford and New Haven after completion. The addition of these branches brought the Hartford and New Haven's total mileage to 79 miles (127 km). [1]
Middletown was initially planned to be directly served by the Hartford and New Haven, but was bypassed. In 1844, a number of residents of the city took the matter into their own hands by forming the Middletown Railroad, which in 1848 built a 9 mile (14 km) long railroad line between Middletown and the Hartford and New Haven main line at Berlin. [9] The Middletown Railroad was purchased by the Hartford and New Haven in 1850. [1] [9]
An extension of the Middletown Railroad, appropriately named the Middletown Extension Railroad, was chartered in 1857 to connect Middletown and the Connecticut River. [10] The railroad was built in 1860, and merged into the Hartford and New Haven in 1861. [11]
The Middletown Railroad was abandoned between Berlin and East Berlin in 1940, and from East Berlin to the outskirts of Middletown in 1961. Half a mile in Berlin and a mile in Middletown have remained in service for local industries. [1]
In 1845, interests in Hartford formed the Branch Company, which built a short spur from the Hartford and New Haven main line in Hartford, to the banks of the Connecticut River. The Hartford and New Haven absorbed the Branch Company in 1850. [9]
New Britain was another city bypassed by the original Hartford and New Haven main line. Much like in Middletown, in 1852 citizens there chartered the New Britain and Middletown Railroad, which built a 2 mile (3.2 km) long branch connecting their city to Berlin in 1865. [9] This short railroad contracted out train operations to the Hartford and New Haven, before the latter company purchased it outright in 1868. [1]
Formed in 1868, the Windsor Locks and Suffield Railroad built a 5 mile (8 km) long branch between Suffield and the Hartford and New Haven main line at Windsor Locks in 1870. Upon the completion of construction and the railroad's opening on December 12, 1870, it was operated by the Hartford and New Haven, and was formally merged into that company in 1871. [1] [9] [12]
The New York, New Haven and Hartford Railroad, commonly known as The Consolidated, or simply as the New Haven, was a railroad that operated principally in the New England region of the United States from 1872 to December 31, 1968. Founded by the merger of the New York and New Haven and Hartford and New Haven railroads, the company had near-total dominance of railroad traffic in Southern New England for the first half of the 20th century.
The Providence and Worcester Railroad is a Class II railroad operating 612 miles (985 km) of tracks in Rhode Island, Massachusetts, and Connecticut, as well as New York via trackage rights. The company was founded in 1844 to build a railroad between Providence, Rhode Island, and Worcester, Massachusetts, and ran its first trains in 1847. A successful railroad, the P&W subsequently expanded with a branch to East Providence, Rhode Island, and for a time leased two small Massachusetts railroads. Originally a single track, its busy mainline was double-tracked after a fatal 1853 collision in Valley Falls, Rhode Island.
The Central New England Railway was a railroad from Hartford, Connecticut, and Springfield, Massachusetts, west across northern Connecticut and across the Hudson River on the Poughkeepsie Bridge to Maybrook, New York. It was part of the Poughkeepsie Bridge Route, an alliance between railroads for a passenger route from Washington to Boston, and was acquired by the New York, New Haven & Hartford Railroad in 1904. The New Haven ran the CNE as a separate company until finally merging it in 1927. The vast majority of the system was abandoned by the 1930s and 1940s. Surviving portions of the Central New England Railway are operated by the Central New England Railroad and the Housatonic Railroad.
The Boston and Albany Railroad was a railroad connecting Boston, Massachusetts to Albany, New York, later becoming part of the New York Central Railroad system, Conrail, and CSX Transportation. The mainline is currently used by CSX for freight as the Berkshire Subdivision and Boston Subdivision. Passenger service is provided on the line by Amtrak, as part of their Lake Shore Limited service, and by the MBTA Commuter Rail system, which owns the section east of Worcester and operates it as its Framingham/Worcester Line.
The New York and New England Railroad (NY&NE) was a railroad connecting southern New York State with Hartford, Connecticut; Providence, Rhode Island; and Boston, Massachusetts. It operated under that name from 1873 to 1893. Prior to 1873 it was known as the Boston, Hartford and Erie Railroad, which had been formed from several smaller railroads that dated back to 1846. After a bankruptcy in 1893, the NY&NE was reorganized and briefly operated as the New England Railroad before being leased to the competing New York, New Haven and Hartford Railroad in 1898.
The Norfolk County Railroad was a railroad in Massachusetts, United States. Chartered as two different companies in 1846 and 1847, it completed a rail line between Dedham and Blackstone in 1849. A branch to Medway, Massachusetts was built in 1852. The railroad was leased by the Boston and New York Central Railroad, succeeded by the Boston and Providence Railroad and the East Thompson Railroad, before the Norfolk County Railroad returned to independent operation in 1858. In 1866, the Boston, Hartford and Erie Railroad leased the Norfolk County. The Rhode Island and Massachusetts Railroad was completed in 1877 from Franklin southward to Valley Falls, Rhode Island, and became a branch of the Norfolk County mainline. The northernmost portion of the main line from Islington to Dedham was rerouted to the east in 1881, and the original alignment abandoned two years later. The New York, New Haven and Hartford Railroad assumed operation of the Norfolk County lines in 1898.
The New York and New Haven Railroad (NY&NH) was a railroad connecting New York City to New Haven, Connecticut, along the shore of Long Island Sound. It opened in 1849, and in 1872 it merged with the Hartford & New Haven Railroad to form the New York, New Haven & Hartford Railroad. The line is now the Metro-North Railroad New Haven Line and part of Amtrak's Northeast Corridor.
The Housatonic Railroad is a Class III railroad operating in southwestern New England and eastern New York. It was chartered in 1983 to operate a short section of ex-New York, New Haven and Hartford Railroad in northwestern Connecticut, and has since expanded north and south, as well as west into New York State.
The New Haven–Springfield Line is a railroad line owned by Amtrak from New Haven, Connecticut, north to Springfield, Massachusetts, serving the Knowledge Corridor. As a branch of the Northeast Corridor just north of New Haven State Street station, it is served by approximately seven daily Northeast Regional round trips, some continuing from New Haven to Washington, D.C., along the Corridor and others terminating at New Haven as shuttles. On weekends, there is one train daily to Roanoke, Virginia. It is also served by the daily Vermonter, which starts in Washington, D.C., and continues north from Springfield, finally terminating in St. Albans, Vermont. The line is part of the Inland Route connecting Boston and New York via Hartford, Springfield, and Worcester, in contrast to the "Shore Line" along the Connecticut Shore and through Rhode Island.
The Central New England Railroad is a railroad in and near Hartford, Connecticut. It began operations in 1995 on former Conrail trackage.
The Connecticut Southern Railroad is a 90-mile (140 km) long short-line railroad operating in Connecticut and Massachusetts. The company was formed in 1996 as a spinoff of Conrail by shortline holding company RailTex and subsequently acquired in 2000 by RailAmerica. Since 2012, it has been a subsidiary of Genesee & Wyoming. CSO is headquartered in Hartford, Connecticut, site of its Hartford Yard. The company also operates East Hartford Yard.
Berlin station is a train station located in the Kensington neighborhood of Berlin, Connecticut. It is on the New Haven–Springfield Line and is served by Amtrak's Northeast Regional, Amtrak Hartford Line, and Valley Flyer, in addition to the Hartford Line commuter rail. Two high-level platforms, each six cars long connected by an overhead pedestrian bridge opened at the Hartford Line service launch on June 16, 2018. On December 21, 2016, the historic 1900-built station building was destroyed by a fire.
The New Haven and Northampton Railroad was a railroad originally built alongside a canal between 1847 and 1850 in Connecticut. Leased by the New York and New Haven Railroad from 1849 to 1869, the railroad expanded northwards to Massachusetts and its second namesake city in 1859. Upon the end of the lease in 1869, the company expanded further into Massachusetts, reaching as far north as Shelburne and Turners Falls.
The Norwich and Worcester Railroad (N&W) was a railroad in the U.S. states of Connecticut and Massachusetts. Its north-south mainline ran between its namesake cities of Worcester, Massachusetts, and Norwich, Connecticut,. The Providence and Worcester Railroad (P&W) owns the ex-N&W line and operates freight service.
The Housatonic Railroad was a railroad in the U.S. states of Connecticut and Massachusetts, chartered in 1836. Opened between Bridgeport, Connecticut, and New Milford, Connecticut, in 1840, it was completed to a connection with the Western Railroad in West Stockbridge, Massachusetts, in 1842. Branches were later built to Pittsfield, Massachusetts, Danbury, Connecticut, and Derby, Connecticut, the latter as part of the Housatonic Railroad's purchase of the New Haven and Derby Railroad in 1887.
The Connecticut Valley Railroad was a railroad in the state of Connecticut founded in 1868. The company built a line along the Connecticut River between Hartford and Old Saybrook, which opened in 1871. It was reorganized as the Hartford and Connecticut Valley Railroad in 1880, and leased by the New York, New Haven and Hartford Railroad in 1887. Following partial abandonments by the New Haven Railroad and successor Penn Central Transportation Company between 1968 and 1972, the line south of Middletown was revived as the Valley Railroad, a heritage railroad, while the portion in Middletown and northward saw operation by several freight railroads. As of 2022, the Providence and Worcester Railroad and Connecticut Southern Railroad both operate portions of the former Connecticut Valley Railroad.
Cedar Hill Yard is a classification yard located in New Haven, North Haven and Hamden, Connecticut, United States. It was built by the New York, New Haven and Hartford Railroad in the early 1890s in and around New Haven's Cedar Hill neighborhood, which gave the yard its name. Electrical catenary for electric locomotives was added to the yard in 1915. To handle increasing traffic as a result of World War I, the yard was greatly expanded between 1917 and 1920 with additional construction along both sides of the Quinnipiac River. The construction project added two humps where railroad cars were sorted into trains by gravity. The yard was further modernized in the 1920s, becoming one of the busiest railroad yards in the United States, and the most important yard in the entire New Haven Railroad system.
Railroads have played an important role in New England ever since the Granite Railway, America's first commercial railway, began operations in Massachusetts in 1826. As industrialization spread across the region, hundreds of railroads were built throughout the 19th century. Railroad mileage peaked around World War I, and from that point on mileage began to shrink. Despite this, railroads continue to be important for freight and passenger transportation in the region, with the New Haven Line holding the title of busiest railroad line in the entire United States.
The Connecticut Central Railroad was a railroad in Connecticut and Massachusetts, which connected East Hartford, Connecticut and Springfield, Massachusetts. Founded in 1871, it was built between 1874 and 1876, and operated independently until being leased by the New York and New England Railroad in 1880. In the 21st century, the line remains in service between East Hartford and Scantic, Connecticut, and out of service to the Massachusetts state line, beyond which it has been abandoned.
The Meriden, Waterbury, and Connecticut River Railroad was a railroad in the state of Connecticut. The charter, originally granted in 1871 to the Meriden and Cromwell Railroad, was obtained by Meriden residents and construction began in 1883. The line opened between the city of Meriden, Connecticut, and the Connecticut River in Cromwell, Connecticut, in 1885. An extension to Waterbury, Connecticut, was completed in 1888 as the Meriden and Waterbury Railroad, and the two companies merged to form the Meriden, Waterbury and Connecticut Railroad.
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