Green Mountain Railroad

Infobox SG rail
railroad_name=Green Mountain Railroad
marks=GMRC
locale=Vermont and New Hampshire
start_year=1964
end_year=present
hq_city=Bellows Falls, VT

The Green Mountain Railroad reporting mark|GMRC is a class III railroad operating in Vermont.

GMRC currently operates on tracks that had been owned by the Rutland Railroad and Boston and Maine Railroad. The railroad services North Walpole, New Hampshire and Rutland, Vermont. Corporate colors are green and yellow.

As steam engines dropped their fires all over America, New England industrialist F. Nelson Blount began to acquire locomotives and bring them to the former Boston & Maine roundhouse and yard at North Walpole, New Hampshire. This collection eventually became the Steamtown USA museum. When a strike in 1961 shut down the Rutland Railroad, Blount sought to take over the Rutland-Bellows Falls section to operate excursions for his Steamtown collection. The state of Vermont proposed that he offer freight services as needed between Bellows Falls and Ludlow. In 1964, the Steamtown collection moved across the river to the small yard at Bellows Falls, Vermont, and freight service under the Green Mountain Railroad banner began in 1965.

Understanding that the future of the museum and the railroad were at stake, employees persuaded Blount to lease the entire line up to Rutland. Interchange was made with the Delaware and Hudson and the Vermont Railway at Rutland instead of the Boston & Maine at Bellows Falls. Interchange was commenced shortly thereafter with the B&M and the Central Vermont Railroad, creating some through traffic for the GMRC which continues to this day with Pan-Am Railways' Springfield Terminal Railway and CV's successor, New England Central, at Bellows Falls.

Blount's untimely death in 1967 saw big changes to the railroad. The Green Mountain Railroad was separated from the museum operations and became an independent employee-owned company. In 1984, the Steamtown collection was moved to the ex-Lackawanna shop site in Scranton, Pennsylvania, and is now owned by the National Park Service.

GMRC is now owned by Gerome Hebda and David Wulfson. Control of the GMRC has been assumed by the Vermont Rail System, which puts all remaining former Rutland Railroad trackage under the control of a single corporation once more. GMRC retains its separate identity, including an updated version of its green and yellow Rutland-inspired paint scheme.

External links

* [http://www.rails-vt.com/ Green Mountain Railroad -- Official Website]