The is a historic
Canadian Railway . It was comprised of two lines, one connecting
Halifax with
Windsor , the other connecting Halifax with
Pictou via
Truro .
The railway was incorporated
March 31 ,
1853 and received a charter to build railway lines from Halifax to Pictou by way of Truro, as well as from Halifax to
Victoria Beach on the
Annapolis Basin opposite
Digby by way of Windsor. The company also received a charter to build from Truro to the border with
New Brunswick .
The railway line to Windsor (known as the Windsor Branch) was opened in June
1858 and the line to Truro (known as the Eastern Line) was opened in December
1858 . No further work was undertaken on the line to Victoria Beach beyond Windsor but the Eastern Line to Pictou Landing was completed by June
1867 , under the supervision of
Sir Sandford Fleming . The construction of the Nova Scotia Railway by the colonial government was partly encouraged by the construction failures and ongoing delays in building the
Shubenacadie Canal ; indeed the success of the railway came at the expense of the canal which opened in
1861 and soon fell into disrepair from lack of use.
One noteworthy early feature of operations on the Nova Scotia Railway was the first known case of
Intermodal operations involving the "piggyback" transport of road vehicles on railway cars. Farmers in the Windsor area were able to drive their teams of horses and loaded wagons onto railway cars and be transported into Halifax to sell their loads, returning to Windsor the same day.
The Windsor Branch was leased to the
Windsor And Annapolis Railway in
1871 . The W&A became part of the
Dominion Atlantic Railway or DAR in
1894 and the DAR itself was purchased by the
Canadian Pacific Railway or CPR in
1912 , although it was operated as a separate entity. When the DAR was sold by CPR in
1994 , the Windsor Branch came under the control of the shortline
Windsor And Hantsport Railway .
The rest of the Nova Scotia Railway became part of the
Intercolonial Railway in
1872 , which in turn was controlled by
Canadian Government Railways from
1915 -
1918 and was merged into the
Canadian National Railways or CNR in
1918 . The Halifax to Truro line remains part of CN, however the rest of the Eastern Line from Truro to Pictou was sold by CN in
1993 to the
Cape Breton And Central Nova Scotia Railway as part of CN's sale of the entire Truro to
Sydney line.
- Iron Roads of Nova Scotia, David E. Stephens, Lancelot Press, Windsor NS
