Chicago and Canada Southern Railway

Chicago and Canada Southern Railway
Locale	west-southwest from the Detroit, MI area
Track gauge	4 ft 8 1⁄2 in (1,435 mm) (standard gauge)

The Chicago and Canada Southern Railway was a planned extension of the Canada Southern Railway west from Grosse Ile, Michigan to Chicago, Illinois. The line was only built to Fayette, Ohio, and was later split between the Detroit, Toledo and Ironton Railway and Lake Shore and Michigan Southern Railway.

History

1872 map, including the Portland, Rutland, Oswego and Chicago Railroad

In 1873 the Canada Southern Railway reached Michigan from Buffalo, New York via a train ferry and the Canada Southern Bridge Company across Grosse Ile. To continue west to Chicago, the Chicago and Canada Southern Railway was chartered July 11, 1871. The line had only reached Fayette, Ohio (though grading was done further west) in September 1878 when the Panic of 1873 had its full effect and construction was halted. At that time the Canada Southern was reorganized, and the Chicago and Canada Southern was sold on November 22, 1888 to the Detroit and Chicago Railroad, owned by the Lake Shore and Michigan Southern Railway.

The track between Grosvenor and Corbus, in the middle of the line, was abandoned in 1893. In 1897 it was abandoned from Corbus east to Dundee, and in March 1898 the line east of Dundee was sold to the Detroit and Lima Northern Railroad, which became part of the Detroit, Toledo and Ironton Railway. The remaining piece west of Grosvenor was operated as a branch of the Lake Shore and Michigan Southern's Old Road from the Grosvenor end.

West from Montpelier, Ohio to beyond North Liberty, Indiana, the unfinished C&CS alignment was later used^[1] by the Wabash Railroad, which completed its line between Montpelier and Gary, Indiana in 1893.

See also

• Michigan Air-Line Railroad, another partially built western extension of the Canada Southern Railway

References

1. ^ Historic maps showing the planned route where the Wabash later built: Andres & Baskin, Atlas of Williams County, Ohio, 1874; Baskin, Forster & Co., Illustrated Atlas of the State of Indiana, 1876

• Railroad History Database
• History of the Lake Shore and Michigan Southern Railway Company
• DT&I - The Railroad That Went No Place