The St. Lawrence and Atlantic Railroad , known as St-Laurent et Atlantique Quebec in Canada, is a short-line railway operating between Portland, Maine, on the Atlantic Ocean, and Montreal, Quebec, on the St. Lawrence River. It crosses the Canada–US border at Norton, Vermont, and Stanhope, Quebec, and is owned by short-line operator Genesee & Wyoming.

The line was built by the Atlantic and St. Lawrence Railroad in the U.S. and the St. Lawrence and Atlantic Railway in Canada, meeting at Island Pond, Vermont, south of the international border. Major communities served include Portland and Lewiston in Maine; Berlin, New Hampshire; Island Pond, Vermont; and Sherbrooke and Montreal in Quebec.

History

thumb|upright|alt=Black print by engraving on white paper of the bust of a middle-aged white man with hair parted on the side and bunching up kind of like Princess Leia around his ears with a mildly stern countenance and the smallest jowls. He is wearing a standard suit jacket over a white shirt and a simple bow tie around the collar. There is nothing in the background but the white of the paper.|Founder [[John A. Poor]]

The line was proposed as a connection between Portland and Sherbrooke, Canada East, in 1844 by Portland entrepreneur John A. Poor. Portland was desperate to connect its ice-free port with Montreal, and Maine was at risk of being eclipsed by a similar proposal running from nearby Boston, Massachusetts. Writer, critic, and Atlantic and St. Lawrence Railroad investor, John Neal wrote of the necessity "to drive Boston out of the business and secure [a] monopoly." Montreal saw an advantage in linking with the smaller port at Portland, and Poor's idea became a reality.

Atlantic and St. Lawrence Railroad

[[Portland Company locomotive Coos c. 1856|thumb]]

The Atlantic and St. Lawrence Railroad was chartered in Maine on February 10, 1845; New Hampshire on July 30, 1847; and Vermont on October 27, 1848, to build a continuous line from Portland northwest into northeastern Vermont. William Pitt Preble was the railroad's first president. The line was originally built to the Portland gauge of . Construction started in Portland on July 4, 1846. The first section, from Portland to Yarmouth, opened July 20, 1848. Further extensions up the Royal River to Danville (now Auburn) opened in October 1848 and to Mechanic Falls in February 1849. Construction then proceeded up the Little Androscoggin River to Oxford in September 1849 and Paris in March 1850. Construction was then completed down the Alder River to the Androscoggin River at Bethel in March 1851. Simultaneous construction of Portland gauge connecting railways occurred from Danville and Mechanic Falls. Sections into and within New Hampshire opened to Gorham on July 23, 1851, and Northumberland July 12, 1852, and the full distance to Island Pond, Vermont, on January 29, 1853.

Construction began with three locomotives built in Britain, but John Poor had organized the Portland Company with locomotive erecting shops adjacent to the railroad yard and wharves at Portland. Approximately half of the early Portland Company production was 25 Portland-gauge locomotives built for the Atlantic & St. Lawrence. These 4-4-0 locomotives weighing 20 to 25 tons were augmented by locomotives built elsewhere when the road was completed to Montreal.

Canadian National Railways Berlin subdivision

The GTR's bankruptcy in the early 1920s saw it nationalized by the Canadian federal government, which merged it into the nascent Canadian National Railways (CNR). Unfortunately for Portland, the CNR also included various other rail lines to ice-free Canadian ports in the Maritimes, notably Halifax, Nova Scotia, and their now ex-GTR mainline to Montreal soon became a secondary mainline under CNR as traffic dropped significantly. Within a decade, annual export tonnage leaving Portland declined to 21,000 tons, from an average of 600,000 tons during the early 1920s. Dressed meat from Chicago to Maine continued to use the shorter Canadian routing as long as railway reefers remained competitive with highway trucking.

From 1934 to 1939 the twice-weekly Maine Coast Special from Montreal left the Grand Trunk at Yarmouth Junction to follow the Maine Central Railroad to Portland's Union Station and then the Boston and Maine Railroad to the beach communities of Old Orchard Beach and Kennebunkport during July and August. The CNR class U-1 4-8-2 locomotives pulling as many as 17 car trains around Dominion Day would be serviced at Rigby Yard in South Portland before making the return trip. Daily except Sunday passenger trains 16 and 17 continued to carry a railway post office between Portland and Island Pond through the 1950s. These trains remained popular with summer vacationers from Montreal, and summer weekend service continued until 1967 after daily train service ended in 1960. Passengers were transported by bus from Portland station to Old Orchard Beach. Portland station was razed in 1966. The Portland–Montreal Pipe Line was built to carry oil from terminals in South Portland to refineries in Montreal; the pipeline followed the GTR route along certain parts and is still in use today. Wharves at Portland were used by the United States Navy as Casco Bay became destroyer base Sail during the Battle of the Atlantic. Grand Trunk Piers housed a Navy supply pier and training schools for combat information center (CIC), night visual lookouts, surface and aircraft recognition, search and fire control radar operators, gunnery spotting, anti-aircraft machine guns, and anti-submarine warfare (ASW) attack.

CNR (CN after the 1960s) continued to operate the Portland-Sherbrooke line as its Berlin Subdivision, but traffic continued to decline. By the late 1980s, following deregulation of the U.S. railroad industry, it became a candidate for divestiture to a shortline operator.

St. Lawrence and Atlantic Railroad

In 1989, the St. Lawrence and Atlantic Railroad (SLR) was formed to take over operation of the Island Pond-Portland section, and several years later this was extended to the border at Norton. In 1998, following Canadian deregulation, the short-line operator formed a subsidiary St. Lawrence and Atlantic Railroad (Quebec) to operate the remaining line from the border at Norton through to Sainte-Rosalie, where it connects with the CNR main line to Montreal.

Reactivated passenger service

In April 2012, the Maine Department of Transportation put a project out to bid which would "purchase, design, and construct a portion of rail line for future passenger service to Lewiston and Auburn." The potential passenger route would operate on tracks operated by the St. Lawrence and Atlantic Railroad. prospective operators of a night train from Montréal to Boston are attempting to get access to the St. Lawrence and Atlantic right-of-way for a 2014-passenger launch.

The section of the SLR between Portland and Auburn has been disused since 2015 and was officially abandoned a decade later.

Bridge collapse

A bridge over the Saint-François River near Brompton, Quebec, collapsed on January 13, 2018. There were no injuries. The preliminary opinion is that the collapse was due to an ice jam and rapid water level rise following an unseasonal day of rain.

Route

  • Milepost 0: Portland terminal facilities including wharves, grain elevators, Portland Company shops, and interchange with Portland Terminal Company until 1984.

thumb|Back Cove Trestle, Portland

  • Milepost 1.5: Back Cove Trestle abandoned following fire damage in 1984
  • Milepost 2.4: East Deering stockyard with resting pens for 2,500 head of export livestock and 15-stall roundhouse with steam locomotive servicing facilities (station closed 1939)
  • Milepost 15.3: Dunn's
  • Milepost 80.5: Wild River bridge