The Shore Line Trolley Museum (Tour)

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The Shore Line Trolley Museum operates a portion of the old “F” trolley route of the Connecticut Company, which provided service from downtown New Haven, through East Haven and into Branford. From 1907 until 1937, the line was extended through Pine Orchard to Stony Creek. Passenger service on the line began July 31, 1900, and was discontinued on March 8, 1947. The museum immediately assumed operation of the line, making this the oldest continuously operating suburban trolley line in the United States. This distinction led to the recognition of the museum’s line and collection on the National Register of Historic Places.

2. Start of Trolley Line

The trolley line was constructed by the Branford Light and Water Company and was backed mostly by local interests. The coming of the trolley in 1900 to the sleepy town of Branford changed life there forever and heralded Branford’s entrance into the modern era. It was an extension of a trolley line that had come six years earlier to the neighboring town of East Haven.

3. Path Car Exhibit

Car 745 was the lead car (on the north end) of a 7-car train which had left Hoboken at 8:42 AM, arrived on Track 3 at about 8:52, and was due to depart the loop station at 9:00 AM for the return trip to New Jersey. Behind it were cars 143-160-845-750-139-612. When the unthinkable happened, the entire PATH station was ordered evacuated, employees included. As a result, there was no loss of life on the train or in the station.

4. Trolley Yard

The Shore Line Trolley Museum’s vehicle collection is diverse both in terms of geographic reach and chronological spread. Included in the collection are some of America’s oldest single-truck cars, many examples of wooden and steel streetcars from the Golden Era of street railways, and several modern and representatives from the high-speed and streamlined era. Rapid Transit (Elevated and Subway), Interurban and Work Cars round out the collection.

5. Barn 3

Housed in these barns are a multitude of examples of transportation that helped shape this nation into what it is today. The trolley car, as a whole, is a cornerstone of the suburbanization of America and one of the main reasons these pockets of suburban towns popped up all over the country during the 1940s and 1950s. These pieces of transportation also transformed cities into what they are today, giving a way for people to navigate the concrete jungles of the country safely, effectively, and cheaply; while also traversing the high-rises and skyscrapers to carve out the streets we use today. Along with all the history associated with each car, we can also see examples of time and location appropriate advertisements throughout every piece in the collection. This, along with the travels down Branfords old “F” line, give every visitor to the museum the truest and most authentic experience possible.

6. Barn 1

7. Inbound Stop

The museum has recently acquired this overlooked, and overgrown parcel of property. Freshly cleared and cleaned this pond has been given a facelift to show all its natural beauty; hosting a multitude of wildlife native to the Connecticut area.

8. Farm River Estuary With a Look Into the Salt Marsh

As we move further down the track, we can get an amazing look into the Farm River Estuary, an enormously complex productive, and fragile estuarine ecosystem with wooded uplands, high-quality freshwater, and brackish tidal marshes. These picturesque floodplains, coves, and inlets provide a critical natural habitat for an immense variety of microbes, plants, insects, amphibians, reptiles, birds (like the osprey nests you can see erected throughout), fish, shellfish and mammals that rely on it for food, water, and shelter, especially during migration and breeding.

9. Quarry Trestle

This Trestle, along with the one you will see later in this tour, was erected around 1900. This one, in particular, was created to maintain the previously existing track in place to carry the quarry rock from where it was harvested, to the old crushing plant, where it was crushed and broken down into smaller manageable pieces to be used in a multitude of different applications.

10. The Old Crushing Plant

Just under the trestle and a short walk through the woods, we can find the remains of the old crushing plant, in use from the late 1700s to the early 1900s this plant was used to crush the rock harvested from the quarry behind it into more manageable pieces. The rock was then used in various forms of construction, one of the most notable places being Liberty Island, the home of the Statue of Liberty. This site is a mere shell of its former glory, in its heyday, the tops of the building reached as tall as the trees on the sight now with multiple barges being filled to the brim with traprock along their journeys through Farm River to where ever the rock was being used to build.

11. Open Quarry with Osprey Nests

Here we can see another outcrop of the Farm River, the same waterway we took a closer look at earlier in this tour. This time we are greeted with a wide-open quarry and salt marshes, as well as a spectacular view of one of the prominent birds you can see through this watercourse, the Osprey. Along the channel, you can see multiple perching points that have been set up to give these birds a place to nest and raise their young.

12. Farm River Trestle

Built as part of the track, a necessary addition given the throughway the line followed, this bridge has held through the years to safely and efficiently bring passengers through the line starting in the early 1900s. It, along with the other trestle featured, has had several renovations over the years due to natural wear and tear, but its purpose has remained the same.

13. End of Line Trolley Stop

Sadly, we have come to the end of the trolley line, what you can see here is an example of a typical trolley stop you would see all throughout the Greater New Haven Area back in the golden age of streetcar. Here you would wait for the trolley to arrive, being able to see the schedule posted somewhere in the stop, from there you would board, pay your fare, and ride the line till you reached your destination.

This Tour is a Virtual Museum or Site Tour.

The Shore Line Trolley Museum

Created by John Proto on February 26th 2017, 5:03:14 pm.

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Description

Shore Line Trolley Museum was incorporated in 1945 as the Branford Electric Railway Association, operating on a portion of the old “F” trolley route of the Connecticut Company, which previously provided service from downtown New Haven, through East Haven and into Branford. The main purpose of this museum is to preserve the history and significance of the trolley car. We own more than 100 vehicles, ranging in ages from the late 1800s to the early 1900s in addition to related artifacts and documents.

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The Shore Line Trolley Museum

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