It’s not quite a return to the city’s glory days of railroading, however starting this week a third railway operator will serve St. Thomas, linking it to Aylmer, Tillsonburg and ultimately on to Courtland.
GIO Railway out of Welland, Ontario is leasing the tracks from CN and it seeks to aggressively pitch new freight customers along the line, explains Neil Johnson, vice-president of GIO Rail Holdings.
Technically GIO is not new to St. Thomas. The company purchased Trillium Railway in 2016 which had operated this same line between 1998 and 2013 under the St. Thomas and Eastern Railway banner.
Commodities carried at that time included grain and chemicals.
GIO will interchange railway cars with CN in St. Thomas.
Christmas Eve not only heralded the arrival of Santa. It bookmarked this new chapter in the city’s colourful railway history.
That day a leased locomotive in GIO colours – which had arrived in St. Thomas the day before from London – trundled down what is known as the Cayuga Subdivision on the way to its home in Tillsonburg where it begins work for its new owner, explains Johnson.
The line has not seen any service since April of 2020 when Ontario Southland ceased operations after six years under contract with CN.
Ontario Southland operates the CP St. Thomas Subdivision linking the city with Woodstock and 17 miles of track between Tillsonburg and Ingersoll.
Brush clearing has been undertaken and several thousand railway ties replaced. Johnson expects service to begin as early as Wednesday of this week.
Service from Tillsonburg to Courtland is not in the immediate plans but the hope is to begin operations on that stretch of the Cayuga Subdivision some time in the future.
GIO Rail also operated the Orangeville-Brampton Railway until service ceased on Dec. 17 of this year.
