Washington and Old Dominion Railroad

Predecessors of the Washington and Old Dominion Railway/Railroad

Originally incorporated as the Alexandria and Harper's Ferry Railroad, construction on the line began in 1855 by the Alexandria, Loudoun and Hampshire (AL&H) Railroad under the presidency of Lewis McKenzie First intended to cross the Blue Ridge Mountains and the Shenandoah River to reach the coal fields in the western part of Hampshire County, Virginia, that are now within Mineral County, West Virginia, the AL&H began operating to Vienna in 1859 from a terminal station near Princess and Fairfax Streets in old town Alexandria. In 1860, the AL&H reached Leesburg in Loudoun County. Because of its proximity to Washington, D.C., the line saw much use and disruption during the Civil War. After the war, the name of the line was changed in 1870 to the Washington and Ohio Railroad. The line was extended from Leesburg to Hamilton in 1870 and to Round Hill in 1874.

Upon acquisition by new owners in the 1880s, the line's name was changed twice: first to the Washington and Western Railroad in 1882 and in the next year to the Washington, Ohio and Western (WO&W) Railroad. However, the line's trains did not serve either Washington, Ohio, or the West.

In 1886, the Richmond and Danville Railroad, whose trunk line travelled between Washington, D.C., and Atlanta with connections to New York City, New Orleans, Mississippi and Florida, leased the WO&W. The Richmond and Danville also acquired a branch that paralleled the WO&W while traveling between Manassas and Strasburg, Virginia, where it connected to railroads in the Shenandoah Valley west of the Blue Ridge that the WO&W did not reach (see: Manassas Gap Railroad). In 1888, the Richmond and Danville began to operate the WO&W's trains between Washington, D.C., and Round Hill.

In 1894, the newly formed Southern Railway absorbed the Richmond and Danville Railroad and acquired the WO&W. In 1900, the Southern Railway extended the line westward for four miles from Round Hill to Bluemont (formerly Snickersville). The Southern Railway designated the line as its Bluemont Branch.

By 1908, steam locomotives were hauling Southern Railway passenger trains from the new Union Station in Washington, D.C., to Alexandria Junction (north of old town Alexandria), where they switched to travel westward on the Bluemont Branch. Connecting trains shuttled passengers between Alexandria Junction and the former AL&H terminal in old town Alexandria. On weekends, express trains carried vacationers from Washington to Bluemont and other towns in western Loudoun County in which resorts had developed.

Meanwhile, in 1906, electric trolleys had begun to run on the Great Falls and Old Dominion Railroad (GF&OD) northwest to Great Falls from Georgetown in Washington, D.C. This line, which John Roll McLean and Stephen Benton Elkins owned at the time, crossed the Potomac River on the old Aqueduct Bridge, passed through Rosslyn, and traveled northwest on a double-tracked line through Arlington and Fairfax County to an amusement park (trolley park) that the railway constructed and operated near the Falls.

Washington and Old Dominion Railway

In 1911, McLean and Elkins formed a new corporation, the Washington and Old Dominion Railway. In that year, they concluded negotiations with the Southern Railway to lease the Southern's Bluemont Branch and to take over all service on the branch on July 1, 1912. The lease excluded the portion of the Southern's route that connected Potomac Yard with the former AL&H terminal in old town Alexandria.

In 1912, the GF&OD became the "Great Falls Division" of the W&OD Railway, while the Southern's Bluemont Branch became a part of the W&OD Railway's "Bluemont Division". The W&OD electrified all of its operations over the next four years, becoming an interurban electric trolley system that carried passengers, mail, milk and freight. From that time onward, W&OD trains crossed over Potomac Yard on a long trestle constructed earlier for the Southern Railway. In contrast to the Southern Railway's earlier Bluemont Branch service, the W&OD Railway's Bluemont Division did not serve Washington's Union Station.

To join its two lines, the W&OD Railway constructed in 1912 a double-tracked Bluemont Division connecting line that traveled between two new junctions in Arlington: Bluemont Junction on the Alexandria-Bluemont line and Thrifton Junction on the Georgetown-Great Falls line. The connecting line passed through Lacey (near the west end of Ballston), crossing on a through girder bridge over a competing interurban electric trolley line, the Fairfax line of the Washington-Virginia Railway (see Northern Virginia trolleys). The rival line carried passengers between Rosslyn, Clarendon, Ballston, Falls Church, Vienna and Fairfax City.

The railway's electrification system distributed 650 volts direct current (DC) to its Bluemont Division cars and trains through overhead catenary lines. Single overhead lines carried the Great Falls Division's electricity over its tracks. Stationary and movable electrical substations containing Westinghouse alternating current (AC) to DC converters were located at various points along the railway's routes.

The W&OD's main passenger line ran from Georgetown and Rosslyn through Thrifton Junction, Bluemont Junction and westward to Bluemont. However, after crossing the Potomac River from Georgetown, many W&OD passengers transferred in Rosslyn to the trolleys of the competing Washington-Virginia Railway. Most of the W&OD's freight trains ran between Potomac Yard, Bluemont Junction and either Rosslyn or various locations along the Bluemont Division.

In 1923, the W&OD Railway ceased operating from Georgetown when the federal government replaced the aging Aqueduct Bridge with the new Francis Scott Key Bridge. At the same time, the railroad constructed a new passenger station in Rosslyn which became its "Washington" terminal.

The W&OD Railway fell upon hard times in the 1930s during the Great Depression. In 1932, the railway went into bankruptcy and was placed in receivership. In 1934, the railway abandoned operations on the Great Falls Division between Thrifton Junction and Great Falls.

Washington and Old Dominion Railroad

In 1936, the Washington and Old Dominion Railroad, a new corporation that Davis Elkins (the son of Stephen Benton Elkins) had created, assumed operation of the remnants of the W&OD Railway, which consisted only of the Railway's Bluemont Division and the portion of the former Great Falls Division that had remained between Rosslyn and Thrifton (which was no longer a junction). Shortly thereafter, in 1939, the railroad abandoned the western end of its line, which had connected the towns of Purcellville and Bluemont.

In 1945, the W&OD Railroad acquired ownership of the section of line between Potomac Yard and Purcellville that the W&OD Railway had earlier leased from the Southern Railway. The Southern Railway retained ownership of the easternmost section of the railroad's route, which still connected Potomac Yard to the Southern's freight and passenger stations in old town Alexandria.

During the 1940s, the W&OD Railroad converted all of its lines' operations from electric to diesel or gasoline power. During that decade, the railroad discontinued its electrified passenger service in 1941, but temporarily resumed passenger service during the Second World War using gas-electric motor cars and cars pulled by diesel-electric locomotives. Passenger and mail service finally ended in 1951; thereafter, the railroad carried only freight.

The Chesapeake and Ohio Railway (C&O) purchased the W&OD Railroad in 1956, but did not change the railroad's name. In 1963, the C&O abandoned the segment of its line that traveled between Rosslyn, Thrifton and Lacey. The Virginia Department of Highways then purchased this segment to acquire a right-of-way for the planned route of Interstate 66 (I-66).

Five years later, in 1968, the railroad, which by that time operated only between Potomac Yard and Purcellville, ceased operations. Shortly thereafter, the C&O sold the railroad's route to the Virginia Department of Highways. The Highway Department then sold most of the route to the Virginia Electric and Power Company (VEPCO) (now Dominion Virginia Power), whose transmission lines had run along the railroad's right-of-way. The Highway Department retained a portion of the route in Arlington immediately east of Falls Church, on which it built I-66, and the section of the route which crossed the Henry G. Shirley Memorial Highway (presently part of Interstate 395 (I-395)) along the Arlington-Alexandria boundary.

Bluemont Division, Alexandria-Bluemont Line

Most of the Bluemont Division's passenger cars or trains ran on the W&OD Railway's Great Falls Division's line from Georgetown over the Aqueduct Bridge through Rosslyn to Thrifton Junction. From Thrifton Junction, the trains ran on the Bluemont Division's connecting line to Bluemont Junction, where they met other Bluemont Division passenger cars or trains that ran from Alexandria, following Four Mile Run in Arlington. Some of the Bluemont Division cars or trains then continued their trips through Falls Church, Vienna, Herndon, Sterling, Ashburn, Leesburg, Clarkes Gap and Purcellville to terminate in Bluemont, Virginia, at the base of the Blue Ridge Mountains, following a route that was similar to that of Virginia State Route 7.

The Norfolk Southern Railway now operates a spur between the Alexandria waterfront and a north-south route that had traveled through Potomac Yard before the Yard closed. The spur formerly served trains traveling from the eastern end of the Bluemont Division to the Southern Railway's freight and passenger stations in old town Alexandria. As the Southern Railway owned and operated the spur and the stations, this section of track remained in operation after the W&OD closed.

A paved trail in Alexandria's linear Mt. Jefferson Park has replaced part of the Bluemont Division's course through that city. The Northern Virginia Regional Park Authority's W&OD Trail travels in the Washington & Old Dominion Railroad Regional Park within the Bluemont Division's former right-of-way from the Alexandria/Arlington boundary through Bluemont Junction to Purcellville. The section of the Bluemont Division between Purcellville and Bluemont has not become a part of any trail, as the W&OD Railroad abandoned this section in 1938, thirty years before the remainder of its line closed.

Stations

The stations on the Alexandria-Bluemont line of the W&OD's Bluemont Division (with locations of sites in 2008) were:

Existing remnants of Bluemont Division, Alexandria-Bluemont Line

The following remnants of the Alexandria-Bluemont Line existed in 2000 and later. Some were photographed in 1997 or in subsequent years:

Rail trails

Other trails

Linear parks

Stations

The stations on the Great Falls Division of the W&OD (with locations of sites in 2008) were:

Thrifton-Bluemont Junction connecting line

The Thrifton-Bluemont Junction connecting line, a component of the W&OD's Bluemont Division, opened in 1912. The line connected the W&OD's Great Falls Division (formerly the Great Falls and Old Dominion Railroad) with the Bluemont Division's Alexandria-Bluemont line.

The line closed in sections in 1963 and 1968. I-66 and the adjacent Custis Trail replaced the line between Thrifton and Washington Boulevard in Ballston. Arlington County's Bluemont Junction Trail replaced the line between Washington Boulevard and Bluemont Junction.

Bluemont Junction, where the Bluemont Junction Trail now meets the W&OD Trail, presently contains an Arlington County railroad display that features a Southern Railway bay window caboose. The caboose was built in 1971, three years after the W&OD Railroad closed.

The stations on the Thrifton-Bluemont Junction connecting line (with locations of sites in 2008) were:

Road

I-66 between Lee Highway (U.S. Route 29) and Washington Boulevard.

Rail Trail

Bluemont Junction Trail between Washington Boulevard and Mile 3.3 of Washington & Old Dominion Railroad Trail.

Other Trail

Custis Trail between Lee Highway (U.S. Route 29) and Washington Boulevard.

Linear park

Bluemont Junction Park between Fairfax Drive and W&OD Trail.

Surviving Locomotives

At least four locomotives that the W&OD had owned or leased still survived in 2014.

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