The Sandy River and Rangeley Lakes Railroad

The Sandy River and Rangeley Lakes Railroad was a narrow gauge railway operating in Northern Maine. A conglomerate of multiple smaller railroads totaling 112 track miles, it was itself a Maine Central subsidiary, and ran a nearly circuitous route. Among these smaller roads, the most significant was the Sandy River Railroad, which ran between Strong and Phillips, ME.

Postcard of the Phillips, ME Station. (Wikipedia Commons)

The two longest branches emanated from Strong, where it met the rest of the Maine Central system. The west line ran north from Strong, ME to S of Eustis, ME; another line would connect Strong to Bigelow, ME.

Image: Wikipedia Commons

It transported lumber as well as mail within the region, although it could not effectively weather the harsh Maine winters. It fell into receivership in 1923 and was finally abandoned in 1935, with the tracks razed a year later.

SR&RL Railroad #24.

In 1970, some local railfans revived and preserved a small part of this line, operating a narrow gauge heritage line near Phillips, ME.

Thanks as always for reading!

Location: Strong, ME 04983, USA

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Underwater Water Slide: Fly Over at Durinrell TikiBad

Image
Have you ever wished to experience being transferred from one pool of liquid to another via a pipe? Had you visited the Dutch water park known as Durinrell , also known as Tikibad before 2010, you would have had the chance. Half water slide, half war crime, this was a unique water slide that was filled to the brim with water, leaving riders completely submerged throughout the journey. Image:  XtremeRidesNL Known as the Fly Over was an underwater water slide, which is exactly how it sounds, and transported riders from one pool to another using the water as propulsion. Built in 1994, riders dove underwater to access the slide, using gravity to transport them upwards via the Communicating Vessels Principle . Riders would be completely underwater for about 15-20 seconds. This is how I imagine those 15-20 seconds felt like while riding the slide. The slide was built to drain water in five seconds or less in case a rider got stuck in the slide or had a medical emergency, but the threat tha
Read more

The Abandoned Route 66 in McCook, IL

Image
Route 66, the iconic "Main Street of America," weaves through the heart of the United States, connecting communities and embodying the spirit of adventure. However, not all sections of this historic highway have stood the test of time. While much of the former US 66 is drivable in one way or another, especially in Illinois, there are some parts are not.  One of the first such roadblocks for would-be travelers heading from Chicago to Los Angeles via the Mother Road, now known as Joliet Road, comes just outside of Chicago in McCook, IL, where the former highway is closed between 55th St and East Ave, and has been for over two decades. (Link to the location on our Ghost Towns Map ) Image: Google Maps at 55th and Joliet Rd in McCook, IL The land that the quarry would eventually take over was part of Stinson Airport in the early days of Route 66, dating back to before 1930. ( Abandoned Airports map ). 1938 USGS Aerial Imagery The quarrying on the south side of the road would
Read more

We asked ChatGPT to write an article on Abandoned Railroads - Here's the Result

Image
We live in an incredibly interesting age of information - made even more interesting by one of the most advanced chatbots that exist. Chatbots have been around for awhile now, but there are very few that have captured the amount of information and artificial intelligence that have been shown by ChatGPT . To demonstrate this, I asked it to write me an article on abandoned railroads with 1200 words in it. After this paragraph, you'll see what ChatGPT wrote. I will provide relevant links in its paragraphs and make any errors that I can see in brackets "[]". What I've noticed is that ChatGPT is great when it comes to general ideas about a particular historical topic, but largely gets facts, dates, and context wrong. Thus, we're still a little ways away from being taken over by computer overlords . Otherwise, thanks as always for reading my material, the rest is by guest blogger ChatGPT! Abandoned railroads are railways that are no longer in use or service. This can ha
Read more