by Stephen C. Host/photos by the author
Ontario Southland Railway, a Canadian short line railway famous for a locomotive roster worthy of any museum, instead uses its roster for freight on a daily basis. Much has been written about the OSR; following a brief history, we will focus on contemporary operations and how things run today, what to expect when you visit, and where to go for photos. Photo captions flesh out details of customers and operations to show a cross section of what you can find today, with a few historical photos tossed in.
History
Ontario Southern Railway was founded in 1992 by Kenneth (Jeff) Willsie, a Canadian Pacific locomotive engineer who happened to own locomotives, with aspirations of running his own railway. Jeff was involved with the Port Stanley Terminal Railway, and when that group declined to run freight traffic, OSR was born as a “freight” spinoff of the PSTR, but without any customers. Jeff worked as an engineer in the Canadian Pacific Railway’s London terminal, and was very well known. When CP wanted out of switching the Petro Canada Clarkson, Ont., refinery, CP suggested getting in touch with Jeff, who owned locomotives, and OSR landed its first customer in 1994.
ABOVE: Ingersoll is the operational heart of OSR where most jobs are found working at some point in the day, and fan out to go east, west, or south. OSR trains may meet in the yard in Ingersoll or on the wye by CAMI. The view was taken October 4, 2018.
After hiring a few people, OSR began switching the refinery and provided almost 15 years of reliable service. With one customer under their belt, OSR soon found themselves expanding by taking over operations of the Guelph Junction Railway on January 1, 1998, after the city scrambled to find an operator at the last minute. Again, Jeff Willsie and OSR were tapped, they quickly took over operations and provided nearly 22 years of excellent service. From nearly the beginning, OSR had been chasing various branch lines that CP was looking to unload, and this cumulated in OSR’s lease of the CP Port Burwell Subdivision from Ingersoll to Tillsonburg on February 26, 1998, which continues today.
OSR also lost business too, Petro Canada would switch from OSR to Railserve in 2008, but OSR chased bigger fish, winning the CP St. Thomas Subdivision from Woodstock to St. Thomas in December 2009, including the very busy General Motors/Suzuki joint venture Cami Automotive assembly plant, and this also continues to this day.
ABOVE: OSR’s patched CPR “Action Red” GP9s lead the St. Thomas job as they work Sylvite in Putnam, Ont., November 7, 2020.
In 2013, after a short line gave up on the nearby CNR Cayuga Subdivision which extended from St. Thomas eastward to Tillsonburg and Delhi, OSR would spend five years making a go of that line under a temporary switching contract with CN, until OSR gave it back to CN in April 2020. This line would be re-opened by a different operator by end of 2021.
The Guelph Junction Railway also wanted a change and would switch to a new operator in August 2020 after nearly 22 years of OSR operation. As of January 2024 the OSR now operates the CP Port Burwell and St. Thomas Subdivisions, which are connected directly to their Salford headquarters, and no longer operates any “satellite” operations…
Read the rest of this article in the April 2024 issue of Railpace Newsmagazine. Subscribe Today!
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