The Boston and Lowell Railroad was a railroad that operated in Massachusetts in the United States. It was one of the first railroads in North America and the first major one in the state. The line later operated as part of the Boston and Maine Railroad's Southern Division.thumb|right|Late 19th century map of the Boston & Lowell Railroad (drawn in red)

Formation

The Boston and Lowell Railroad was preceded by the Middlesex Canal. Converting the canal to a railroad would eliminate the issue of transportation being unavailable during the winter, when the canal froze. Patrick Tracy Jackson led the task of convincing the state legislature to fund the project. This proved difficult, as the investors of the Middlesex Canal were against building a new form of transportation designed to replace their canal.

Because, prior to 1872, there was no provision in Massachusetts state law for chartering railroads, all had to be chartered by special acts of legislature. This made it slow and inefficient to charter a railroad because the politicians had to agree; the issue would become partisan. This also meant that the legislature would not let the investors build the line unless they could show it was completely necessary.

The investors were successful because they convinced the legislature that the canal was inherently incapable of providing what they needed: reliable, year-round freight transport. Investors in the Boston and Lowell Railroad received a charter on June 5, 1830, with no provision for reparations to the Middlesex Canal's investors. It was a favorable charter because in addition to the right to build and operate a railroad between Lowell and Boston, it gave a thirty-year monopoly on the right to have a railroad there. The people along the road and in terminal-end cities bought large amounts of stock, financing half the company.

Construction

The Board of Directors of the Boston and Lowell Railroad, armed with a charter, now had the task of surveying and building the line. They brought in James Fowle Baldwin, son of Col. Loammi Baldwin, who had engineered the Middlesex Canal, to do the surveying, and charged him with finding a gently sloped path from Lowell to Boston, with few grade crossings and well away from town centers. This latter point ended up being quite inconvenient later on. No one had any idea of the future possibility of railroads acting as public transportation, or if they did they were not paid any attention by the builders or financiers of the road.

The right-of-way that Baldwin surveyed did well in each of these characteristics. The path sloped up at a gentle ten feet per mile at the maximum, and there were only three grade crossings over the entire distance. The path was close to the older Middlesex Canal path, but was straighter - as boats can turn more sharply than trains. To achieve this superior linearity, it needed small amounts of grade elevation in places. The route ignored Medford center entirely, going through West Medford instead, and totally bypassed Woburn and Billerica. This would have to be corrected later with various spurs (the one to Medford being built off the Boston and Maine Railroad), but were always sources of annoyance to both riders and operators.

The proposed route was accepted by the Board of Directors of the Boston and Lowell Railroad, and work began on the building phase. The road was begun from both ends at once, and some sources say that they both started on the right hand side of the right-of-way, missing in the middle and having to put in an embarrassing reverse curve to tide them over until they built the other side. Yankee and Irish laborers were hired to construct the railroad, which was made especially difficult and because the Directors wanted to make the road using the best techniques then known. This, for them, meant laying imported British iron rails with a wall of granite under each rail. They did this because it was commonly believed that the train would sink into the ground if the rails did not have strong support.

The first track was completed in 1835, and freight service began immediately. On May 27, 1835, it made its maiden trip to Boston, with Patrick Tracy Jackson, George Washington Whistler, and James Baldwin aboard. The solid granite roadbed proved to be much too rigid, jolting the engine and cars nearly to pieces. Repairs on the locomotives (there were two at the time) would sometimes take most of the night, trying to get them ready for the next day's service. The much poorer Boston and Worcester Railroad could not afford a granite bed and so was built with modern wooden ties. This turned out to be far superior, so the owners of the Boston and Lowell decided they would upgrade their entire roadbed to wood when they added a second track.

The original Boston terminal was at the north corner of Causeway Street and Andover Street (halfway between Portland and Friend streets), at the westernmost edge of the current North Station. The bridge over the Charles River to access it was the first movable railroad bridge in the United States. The original Lowell terminal was at the south corner of Merrimack Street and Dutton Street.

Early operation

The quantity of freight traffic on the Boston and Lowell Railroad was large from the start (as was expected) with Lowell's textile companies bringing in raw materials and sending out finished goods. The high level of passenger traffic, however, was not anticipated. Trains traveled on unwelded rails which were laid on a granite roadbed, which made for an extremely bumpy ride. The railroad switched to wooden ties.

Locomotives

The first locomotives on the B&L were copies of the successful Planet class built locally in Lowell.

The Boston and Maine Railroad

thumb|Map of the Southern Division as it was in 1887, just before it was leased by the [[Boston and Maine Railroad, including the original Boston to Lowell mainline|300x300px]]

Another railroad was chartered in the early 1840s whose fortunes would be closely tied to those of the Boston and Lowell. This was the Boston and Maine Railroad. This railroad ran down from Portland, Maine, through a bit of southern New Hampshire, to Haverhill in northeastern Massachusetts, connected to the Boston and Lowell in Wilmington, and then used Boston and Lowell track to Boston. This route was conceptualized in 1834, but took a long time to be built, mostly because, unlike the Boston and Lowell, it did not have a secure base of funding like the Lowell textile companies. It took two years to get to Andover, another year to get to Haverhill, three more to get to Exeter, New Hampshire, and did not get to Portland until 1852.

This extra traffic on the Boston and Lowell Railroad, especially with the line still over granite, provided the extra impetus to double track and upgrade. In 1838, the B&L began two years of extensive track improvements, first laying a second track on wood, and with that one built, going back and re-laying the old track on the more forgiving wood as well. Boston and Lowell traffic continued to increase, and even with double tracks the schedule became tight enough that the Boston and Maine trains, as renters, began to be pushed around to annoying hours, often having to wait over an hour in Wilmington before being allowed to proceed on to Boston.

The B&M soon tired of what they perceived as selfishness and decided to build its own track to Boston from Haverhill so that it would not have to rely on the B&L. The B&L tried to fight the B&M in court but failed because the monopoly granted in its charter was only good for traffic between Boston and Lowell. The shortcut, part of today's Haverhill/Reading Line, was started in 1844 and was in use by 1848. While the B&M was building it, they were still running their trains to Boston on the B&L. This made for a lot of conflict, with the B&L trying to squeeze every last penny out of the B&M before it lost the opportunity. The B&M tried to deal with this in court, and got the judge to forbid the B&L from raising rates until the case was done, but by the time they were close to an agreement, the bypass was complete.

With B&M business gone, the B&L realized how much they had been relying upon their renters. Additionally, the Lowell mills began to decline somewhat and there was less freight traffic for the line to move. Over the next four decades, the B&L declined until the more successful B&M leased it on April 1, 1887.

Branches

The B&L built or leased many branches to serve areas not on its original line. Immediately before its lease by the B&M in 1887, it had five divisions—the Southern Division (including the original line), the Northern Division, the White Mountains Division, the Vermont Division, and the Passumpsic Division. Additionally, it leased the Central Massachusetts Railroad in 1886.

Southern Division

The main part of the Southern Division was the mainline between Boston and Lowell.

;Charlestown

The Charlestown Branch Railroad was not itself taken over by the B&L, but as originally built in 1840 it was a short spur from the B&L to wharves in Charlestown. In 1845 the Fitchburg Railroad leased it and incorporated it into their main line.

;Mystic River

The Mystic River Branch served the Mystic River waterfront on the north side of Charlestown.

;Woburn Loop

The Woburn Branch Railroad (aka the Woburn Loop) opened in 1844, connecting Woburn to the main line towards Boston. The Horn Pond Branch Railroad was a short freight-only branch off the Woburn Branch to ice houses on Horn Pond. The northern loop, built in 1885, continued the line back north to the main line at North Woburn Jct. in South Wilmington. The Horn Pond branch line was abandoned in 1911, the northern loop in 1961, and the original line in 1982.

;Stoneham

The Stoneham Branch Railroad was built in 1862 to connect to Stoneham.

;Lowell and Lawrence

The Lowell and Lawrence Railroad was chartered in 1846 to build a line between Lowell and Lawrence, which opened in 1848. In 1858 the B&L leased the line.

;Salem and Lowell

The Salem and Lowell Railroad was chartered in 1848 as a branch from the Lowell and Lawrence at Tewksbury Junction to the Essex Railroad at Peabody, along which it used trackage rights to Salem. The line was opened in 1850 and operated by the Lowell and Lawrence until 1858, when the B&L leased it along with the Lowell and Lawrence.

;Wilmington (Wildcat) Branch

The Wilmington Branch, now known as the Wildcat Branch, was built just west of the original Boston and Maine Railroad alignment to connect the main line at Wilmington to the Salem and Lowell at Wilmington Junction, providing a shorter route between Boston and Lawrence.

;Lexington and Arlington (Middlesex Central Railroad)

The Lexington and West Cambridge Railroad was chartered in 1845 and opened in 1846, connecting the Fitchburg Railroad at West Cambridge to Lexington, although the "West Cambridge" in the name referred to what is now the town of Arlington. It was operated by the Fitchburg from opening, and leased to the Fitchburg from 1847 to 1859. The line was reorganized as the Lexington and Arlington Railroad in 1868, following the renaming of Arlington. The B&L bought the line in 1870 and built a new connection to their main line at Somerville Junction.

The Middlesex Central Railroad was chartered in 1872 and opened in 1873, extending the line from Lexington to Concord. It was leased from completion to the B&L. An extension west to the Nashua, Acton and Boston Railroad at Middlesex Junction was built in 1879.

;Billerica and Bedford

The Billerica and Bedford Railroad was built in 1877 as a narrow gauge line between the Middlesex Central at Bedford and the B&L at North Billerica. It was sold and abandoned in 1878, and the rails were taken to Maine for the Sandy River Railroad. A new standard gauge branch was built by the B&L in 1885, mostly on the same right-of-way.

|By 1865

|Original location at Prison Point Bridge

|-

|0.9

|By 1865

|1927

|Closed when North Station approaches were realigned

|-

|1.8

|rowspan=4|Somerville

|Prospect Hill

|1840s

|1927

|Originally Milk Row; closed when North Station approaches were realigned

|-

|2.4

|Winter Hill

|January 1, 1863

|February 19, 1937

|

|-

|2.8

|Somerville Junction

|By 1850

|c. 1946

|Formerly Somerville and Taylor's Ledge. Junction with Lexington Branch and Central Massachusetts Branch.

|-

|3.6

|North Somerville

|By 1850

|May 18, 1958

|Formerly Willows Bridge

|-

|4.0

|rowspan=4|Medford

|

|By 1850

September 15, 1977

|May 18, 1958

October 1979

|Formerly Stearns Steps, College Hill, and Tufts College

|-

|4.6

|Medford Hillside

|By 1850

|May 18, 1958

|Formerly Medford Steps

|-

|5.5

|bgcolor=ffdfff|

|By 1838

|

|Originally Medford Gates

|-

|5.9

|Gorham Brooks'

|By 1846

|

|Early flag stop for Woburn Branch trains

|

|-

|24.6

|Bleachery

|

|June 14, 1959

|Junction with Lowell and Lawrence Railroad, Lowell Branch (B&M), and Framingham and Lowell Railroad (NYNH&H)

|-

|25.3

|bgcolor=ffdfff|

|

|

|Junction with Nashua and Lowell Railroad; formerly called Middlesex Street

|-

|26.0

|Merrimack Street

|

|1905

|

|}

Notes

References

  • Wall & Gray. 1871 Atlas of Massachusetts. Map of Massachusetts. USA. New England. Counties - Berkshire, Franklin, Hampshire and Hampden, Worcester, Middlesex, Essex and Norfolk, Boston - Suffolk,Plymouth, Bristol, Barnstable and Dukes (Cape Cod). Cities - Springfield, Worcester, Lowell, Lawrence, Haverhill, Newburyport, Salem, Lynn, Taunton, Fall River. New Bedford. These 1871 maps of the Counties and Cities are useful to see the extent and names of the rail lines.
  • Beers, D.G. 1872 Atlas of Essex County Map of Massachusetts Plate 5. Click on the map for a very large image. This map and the 1871 map of Middlesex County shows the original Boston and Lowell Railroad route through Billerica, Wilmington, Woburn, Winchester, and Medford. It also show the slightly later competing track of the Boston and Maine Railroad through Andover, Reading, Wakefield, Melrose, and Malden. The Wildcat Branch connector in Wilmington is shown in the 1872 maps but not the 1871 map. Also see detailed map of 1872 Essex County Plate 7.
  • Changes to Transit Service in the MBTA district (PDF)
  • 1886 Boston and Lowell Railroad Map
  • MBTA - The Lowell Line

Archives and records

  • Nashua & Lowell Railroad records at Baker Library Special Collections, Harvard Business School.