Kawartha Lakes Railway History

The Kawartha Lakes Railway is my HO scale freelance railway which incorporates certain elements of Ontario based industries and scenery into a fictional road.  The layout was designed to incorporate aspects of two of my favorite roads, the Ontario Northland Railway (ONR) as well as the Canadian Pacific Railway (CP Rail).  In essence, I have stretched the operating area of the ONR over into part of an area covered by the CP, as well as running track south to link with another area which the CP actually covers.  The railway is based on prototypical businesses found in the Peterborough/Lakefield region and well as several present in the Ottawa Valley. 

The setting is September 1985, as the summer comes to an end and the ever-changing weather of autumn descends upon the near north regions of Ontario. 

  

Throughout the KLR, I have tried to incorporate the history of the area into the areas that I model.  While certain key features or aspects couldn’t be modeled due to size constraints, I have tried to include enough key industries for realistic operations, without making the layout too busy. My goal was to mimic the remoteness of the area, having long runs between the yard and the various industries served.  Certain industries that are unique to the area have been included, as well as a few industries which are found in other portions of southern Ontario, but for the convenience of proto-freelance modeling, have been moved to fit onto the KLR. 

The primary purpose is to have the railway serve several small to medium sized industries located in the rural locales of Ontario.  The KLR's traffic base includes forestry products (such as paper, pulpboard, dimensional lumber and pulpwood) along with mining and several other industries.  The rail line serves a number of growing customers including Spruce Falls Pulp and Paper Company, Sherwin Williams Canada, Ontario Natural Products, Indusmin Canada, Ontario Hydro, Beaver Lumber .

The two largest industries on the layout include the Spruce Falls Pulp and Paper mill, which was modeled after the Tembec mills in Temiscaming, Quebec and Kapuskasing, Ontario.  The Unimin mine in Nephton, Ontario, which produces syenite (a mineral in the feldspar family used in glass making and ceramics), and the Muskoka Timber Ltd. operation serve as the other focal industries. The primary interchange is with the CP at Pembroke and Toronto (off the modeled layout), with a secondary interchange with the ONR at North Bay.  While CP discontinued trains east of Havelock and CN terminated its running line to Lakefield, the Kawartha Lakes Railway was able to purchase the trackage and become a profitable shortline, serving the small industries scattered throughout Ontario. 

The KLR was started in 2004, after the dismantling of a predecessor 9x12-ft oval layout. The layout is built using a series of modules, which generally follow the Freemo format.