- Southern New England Railway
The Southern New England Railway was a never-finished plan by the
Grand Trunk Railway (GT) to build arailroad from the GT-ownedCentral Vermont Railway atPalmer, Massachusetts east and south to the all-weather port ofProvidence, Rhode Island . Despite never being finished, large amounts of grading and construction were done, including many largeconcrete supports.The railroad was chartered in April 1910, and was to be built as a completely grade-separated air line, having low grades and long high bridges over
valley s. Construction was begun, but the man in charge (Charles Melville Hays ) sunk with the RMS "Titanic" in 1912. Construction stopped inRhode Island , but continued for a while inMassachusetts so the contractor could get paid for the work. Thus almost all the grading in Massachusetts was completed, and many supports are still in place. Attempts were made throughout the 1920s, and into the early 1930s by politicians and businessmen, mostly fromRhode Island , to restart the work and to get the line completed as a way to break theNew Haven Railroad 's stranglehold on freight traffic in RI., but the Great Depression finally put an end to their efforts.In
Millville, Massachusetts , the SNE would have passed over the Blackstone River on a high-level bridge, with both theNew York and New England Railroad (now abandoned) and theProvidence and Worcester Railroad (still in use) below. Several full-height supports were built, as well as several partial supports in the river.The main route would have gone through
Woonsocket, Rhode Island to downtown Providence, with a branch around the west side to the docks south of downtown.Some of the plans included a branch to
Boston or a separate route to Boston from the Central Vermont, but this never got to the construction stage.References
* [http://www.earlpleasants.com/search_1.asp Railroad History Database]
*Larry Lowenthal, "Titanic Railroad: The Southern New England",Branch Line Press , ISBN 0-9662736-0-5
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