10-02-2012, 02:38 PM
By the Guilford period, early 1980s to 2005 or so, the B&M wasn't much more than a bridge route from the Albany, NY area to Portland, ME. The later you get in this period, the more you have trains running from points on the MEC, like Northern Maine Jct and Waterville, through to East Deerfield or Mechanicville. Massachusetts traffic, including Boston, was more or less left to the Boston & Albany/Conrail/CSX. The Bangor & Aroostook is somewhat similar, hauling a lot of pulpwood and wood chips to paper mills and inbound petroleum and propane, with outbound paper products in boxcars. Its perishable traffic had almost completely dried up by this time period. The Boston & Maine before the 1980s also had paper traffic from Berlin, NH with inbound woodchips from points on line and outbound paper in older style 50-foot (1970s) and 40-foot (1960s and earlier) boxcars. It also had bridge traffic down the Connecticut River line from Canada to the New York area from CP and CN/CV. This was pretty much gone by Guilford.