1894 in rail transport explained

Events

January 1 – Bangor and Aroostook Railroad begins rail service connecting Aroostook County, Maine to the United States rail network.^[1]

April 29 – The Lake Street Elevated Railroad in Chicago is extended west from California & Lake to Laramie (52nd) Avenue.

May 11 – 3,000 employees of the Pullman Palace Car Company go on strike to protest lowered wages without an equivalent reduction in expenses charged in the company town, Pullman, Illinois (a suburb of Chicago).

July 7 – The Wichita Falls Railway, a predecessor of the Missouri–Kansas–Texas Railroad, is incorporated in Texas.^[2]
July 15 – Central Pacific Railroad scraps El Gobernador, at the time the largest locomotive in the world.^[3]

August 4 – The Denver, Leadville and Gunnison Railway in Colorado, which purchased the Denver, South Park and Pacific Railroad five years earlier, enters receivership.
August 7 – The West Highland Railway, operated by the North British Railway, is publicly opened to Fort William, Scotland.^[4]
August 27 – Pontiac Pacific Junction Railway opens the segment between Fort-Coulonge and Waltham, Quebec, a line segment that was completed in February 1888.^[5]

November – Eben B. Thomas succeeds John King as president of the Erie Railroad.^[6]
November 7 - The Southern Pacific Railroad inaugurates the Sunset Express passenger train between New Orleans and San Francisco.^[7]

The Southern Railway is formed from the combination of the Richmond and Danville Railroad system and the East Tennessee, Virginia and Georgia Railroad.
Stearns Manufacturing Company of Erie, Pennsylvania, starts manufacturing Heisler locomotives.
Oliver Robert Hawke Bury moves from the Chief mechanical engineer position at the Great Western Railway of Brazil to the same position at the Entre Ríos Railway in Argentina.^[8]
Construction of first oil-engined locomotive, an experimental unit designed by William Dent Priestman and built by his company, Priestman Brothers of Hull, England.^[9]

March 2 - William H. Osborn, president of Illinois Central Railroad 1855–1865, president of Chicago, St. Louis and New Orleans Railroad 1875–1882, dies (b. 1820).
September 1 - Robert Pearson Brereton, chief assistant to Isambard Kingdom Brunel who completed many engineering projects after Brunel's death in 1859 (b. 1818).

Book: Angier, Jerry . Cleaves, Herb. Bangor and Aroostook, The Maine Railroad. Flying Yankee Enterprises. 1986 . 19 . 0-9615574-2-7.
Web site: Good, Mike. May 19, 1999. Corporate History: Missouri Kansas & Texas Railway. July 7, 2005. https://archive.today/19991115144040/http://tacnet.missouri.org/~mgood/clintonrr/ch_mkt.html. November 15, 1999. dead. mdy-all.
Book: Diebert, Timothy S. . Strapac, Joseph A.. Southern Pacific Company Steam Locomotive Conpendium. Shade Tree Books. 1987. 0-930742-12-5.
Book: Thomas, John. The West Highland Railway. 1965. David & Charles. Dawlish.
Web site: Significant dates in Ottawa railway history . Colin Churcher's Railway Pages . July 30, 2006 . August 25, 2006 . https://web.archive.org/web/20060828225559/http://www.railways.incanada.net/candate/ottawa.htm . August 28, 2006 . dead .
Web site: Erie Railroad presidents. March 15, 2005. https://web.archive.org/web/20050318171642/http://erierr.railfan.net/eriepres.html. March 18, 2005 . dead.
Famous trains of North America . Railway World . 5 January 1906 . 50 . 1 . 15–21 . .
Web site: Biographies of chairmen, managers & other senior railway officers . steamindex.com . 11 January 2023 . 4 May 2024 . Bury, Oliver Robert Hawke .
Book: Webb, Brian. The British Internal Combustion Locomotive 1894–1940. 1973. David & Charles. Newton Abbot. 0-7153-6115-5.