Time Line - 1984

Last Year | Next Year

• January: Amtrak announces plans to discontinue Ann Arbor-Detroit commuter service. [MDOT]

• Winter: The Chessie roundhouse at Wyoming Yard is scheduled for demolition. [MRC-4/1983]

• February 9: The last train cleans up cars on the GTW PO&N branch line between Piegon and Cass City, and the route is officially abandoned. [NB-Sum-1993]

• February 15: Michigan Dept. of Transportation acquires 342 miles of railroad track from Penn Central. [MDOT]

• Early: The C&O acqauires the Toledo Terminal Railroad, the 26-mile road that encircles the city. [MRC-6/1984]

• August 21: Straits carferry the "Chief Wawatam" finishes service. [MDOT]

• August: Coe Rail, Inc. buys Wixom to Walled Lake portion of GTW Jackson Branch. [MRRC]

• September 15: Chessie runs their last train over their Hartford-Paw Paw branch. The line will be reopened on September 8, 1987 as the Kalamazoo, Lake Shore & Chicago. [MRC-3/1988]

• September: Conrail donates its old Detroit River tunnel crane to the Edison institute. [MRC-9/1985]

• October 1: Operations of state owned track in northern Michigan are transferred from the Michigan Northern Ry. to the Tuscola & Saginaw Bay Railroad. [NK]

• Michigan Northern, in an effort to survive, buys the unwanted Bay View to Mackinaw City line from Penn Central and starts a truck-to-rail transfer operation at Pellston with steel from Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario. The line is closed for good on April 12, 1987. The rails were removed in June, 1987. [NK]

• October: Coe Rail begins rail operations on the former Grand Trunk Western rail line from Wixom to Walled Lake. [MDOT]

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• Detroit & Mackinac Railway closes Big Cut quarry.  Idles line between Big Cut and Hawks.

• The CSX abandons its line between Kinde and Port Austin (6.6 miles). [AB]

• Former PRR dock tracks in Muskegon abandoned. [COHS-7/1994]

• Washouts on the former PM line west of Petosky cause the abandonment of the line to Charlevoix. [NK]

• C&O closes the Sebewaing depot. [MRC-06/89]

• The C&O acquires the Port Huron and Detroit Railroad. [MRC-6/1984]

• The Montreal Locomotive Works discontinues building diesel locomotives. [SAM]

 Time line Key:

• Railroad event in Michigan
• Event relating to mining
• Event related to car ferries
• Event outside of Michigan
• Improvement in Technology
• Railroad built or extended
• Railroad abandoned and/or removed
• Economic panic or depression