Belfast & Moosehead Lake Railroad
From: "Sharon Bartholomew" healey4@earthlink.net
I'm trying to find out if the [B&MLRR] train is going to operate this year. Do you happen to know? I saw some kind of a notice on the web indicating that it might not operate in 2005.
Thank you.
Sharon
Anaheim, CA
posted from CPRR Discussion Group at 7:03 AM
5 Comments:
As far as I can tell, it appears as if the B&ML will not be running this year (or perhaps ever again, unfortunately), at least not from Belfast. As I understand it, the out-of-state operator (Railstar Corp. of Cape Vincent, NY) that purchased the B&ML August, 2003, defaulted on its purchase contract last winter by failing to pay land rent to the City of Belfast on its Belfast yard and the railroad thus reverted to its previous owner, Unity Property Management, in February. I see that the B&ML's website has also apparently been recently taken down as well.
While I live in Pennsylvania, I ... have been riding the B&ML for many years. (I was once also a very small stockholder in the line.) Unfortunately the B&ML has been in danger of going under for quite a few years and it appears as if it may finally be happening this time. (There have also been many local interests lusting after its river front property for decades.) However if you read my history of the line you will notice that it has had MORE than nine lives over the past 138 years so there is always the possibility that it may still be rescued at the last moment once again.
We can only hope.
I hope this information is helpful.
Bruce C. Cooper
From: "Joel Norman" mec-bml@earthlink.net
... what was the projected mileage from Belfast Maine to Montreal when the B&ML was planned and can I please get a map of this projected route???
—Joel Norman
Unfortunately I'm afraid that I am not able to answer your questions very completely. The original survey for a route to Canada was made in 1836 by Col. Stephen Long (of the U.S. Army Corps of Topographical Engineers) and Capt. Yule (of the Royal Canadian Engineers) and the Charter for the Belfast & Quebec Railroad Co. was passed by the Maine Legislature in 1837. The only distance I have seen for this proposed route is included in the Report that the engineers made to Gov. Dunlap of Maine in 1836 recommending a line “from Belfast to the Forks of the Kennebec, and by a line of levels thence to the Canadian line ... ” for a distance into Quebec said to total 227 miles. I have never seen a map of this route, however, but you might be able to find one if it exists by contacting the Maine State Archives. You could also check to see if there is information on this route in The Republican Journal. (I believe that the Belfast Public Library has the complete TRJ available on microfilm.) The final place I would also look is in Williamson's massive two volume "History of Belfast" first published in 1877. ...
—Bruce C. Cooper
Thanks all I needed was the mileage – as you know model railroaders take a yard and make a mile ... building a 1950 era layout based on the BML as it would have been if it had bilt all the way to Canada(building it as a bridge between the CN/CP and the MEC and the port of Belfast ... sort of like the BAR at Spearsport Maine. ... ) thanks for your help ... have you a ISBN number for the Belfast history???
—Joel
... As the Williamson history was first published in 1877 (and reprinted in 1913) I do not think it has an ISBN number. You can find used copies, however, on ABE Books, and there is also a modern “History of the City of Belfast” which was published in 2002 by Picton Press which has a chapter on the B&MLRR.
—BCC
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