Ontario & Western Erie Railway Ontario, Ohio
History of Railroads in Ontario
Ontario, founded in December 1834 by Hiram Cook, was the 3rd settlement in the current Ontario area residing in Springfield Township in Western Richland County. Sitting “On The Hill”, Ontario was located at the intersection of Shelby/Lexington-Ontario Rd. and Park Ave. West(St. Rt. 309). Shortly after its beginning, Ontario merged with New Castle, located at Park Ave. West & Rock Rd. and Millsborough located at Lexington-Ontario Rd. & Millsboro Rd.
In 1863, surveyors from the Atlantic & Great Western Railway broke ground to continue their Railway west from Salamanca NY to Marion Ohio. Track crews would lay a 6’ gauge rail through Ontario between 1863 and 1864. In 1865, the A&GW would build a wooden depot between Lexington-Ontario Rd. and Rudy Rd. The Ontario stop would serve as a passenger and freight depot for nearly 80 years before being closed and was demolished in the 1970s. In 1883, the Atlantic & Great Western merged with the Erie Railroad to Marion/Dayton and acquired the Chicago & Atlantic Railway from Marion to Chicago the same year. These mergers would connect Ontario Ohio to large cities like Dayton, Chicago, Cleveland, Buffalo, Hoboken NJ and New York City. Around the late 1880s, the Erie would remove all 6’ gauge rail and replace it with the now standard 4’ 8.5” gauge and would lay a double track along the majority of what was a single tracked A&GW. The A&GW built stone arch bridges over road and waterways. After the Erie merger, the Erie would widen these bridges by pouring concrete that would be connected to the stone arch. These ROWs would now be able to support the double trackage and handle more freight and passenger trains.
After an almost fatal mistake to Ontario and a possible loss of business to the Pennsylvania Railroad, the Erie agreed to demands and in the early 1950s, construction of Harding Yard would begin in Ontario for the soon to be opened Fisher Body(GM). Though the Erie was strong, financially elsewhere the railroad was losing money due to the loss of freight and passenger customers in thanks to the now popular motorized transit and air traffic.
On October 17th 1960, the Erie merged with the Delaware, Lackawanna & Western Railroad to form the Erie Lackawanna. Stricken by the same losses that the Erie and DL&W had faced, the EL would also struggle financially. A major profit for the EL came from a contract given by the United Parcel Service and guaranteed 5 trains a day between N.J. and Chicago. Given the name “The Friendly Service Route”, the Erie Lackawanna’s demise would come in the form of Hurricane Agnus in 1972, which destroyed many miles of track and assets in New Jersey and Southeastern New York State. Though many miles from Ontario, Hurricane Agnus would cripple the EL and send the Railroad into bankruptcy on June 26th 1972. Monies that had been set aside to rebuild the Marion Ohio railyard, which was built on a swamp, would be moved to the east coast to rebuild after Agnus.
Initially declining a merger into the Government formed Consolidated Rail(ConRail), the EL attempted to plot an independent course, anticipating financial reorganization without a heavy debt burden. Between 1972 and 1975, the continued loss of customers and much needed maintenance on rails and rail facilities, the EL petitioned and in 1976 a merger into Conrail was accepted last minute. A tour by Conrail officials would be painful for the Friendly Service Route and its remaining customers along the way. The decision was made to abandon the majority of the route from N.J. to Chicago in favor of other routes coming from fallen railroads like Norfolk Western and Penn Central that reached larger cities with more customers. This would lead to the rails in Ontario to be removed at Rock Rd west to Burt Tower in Galion during the early to mid 1980s. A single track from Mansfield to Harding Yard would be kept to service General Motors, Tappan and a small amount of other customers. What use to be double tracked and saw up to 40 freight trains a day, would be cut down to a single track with a minimum number of trains.
After finally starting to make a profit in 1980, Conrail was privatized from its government control in 1987. 10 years later, in 1997 the Norfolk Southern Railway and the CSX Corp. agreed to acquire the Conrail system and split it into equal parts. Following an approval by the Surface Transportation Board, CSX and NS took control in August 1998 and on June 1 1999, both railroads began operating their respective portions of Conrail with Norfolk Southern controlling the line from Mansfield to Ontario.
Today, Harding Yard serves as a storage yard for railcars that are off demand or at the end of their 50 year life for the Norfolk Southern Railway. The 17 track wide, mile long yard is far from its busy days of moving freight in and out for local customers and long are the days of through service. Still supporting its original East and Westbound rails, a train into Harding Yard is very rare. Removal of Harding Yard would be financially unreasonable for Norfolk Southern, whom like most railroads, continue to struggle financially.