Canandaigua Messenger, May 31, 1949
Messenger Files Depict Decline of Local Trains
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Announcement of the Pennsylvania Railroad company that it would seek the discontinuation of two its four passenger trains operating from this city daily except Sunday occasioned a quick look through the old files of The Messenger.
A random choice in the year 1872, or 77 years ago, reveals that at that time a total of 23 passenger trains operated into the local railroad depot each day. At present there are eight, four in each direction.
In 1872 the New York Central and Hudson River railroad operated five eastbound trains daily starting at 5:55 a.m. and the last leaving at 9:43 p.m. while at the same time six westbound trains left this place, the first each day at 12:17 a.m. and the last at 8:40 p.m.
An additional six trains, three in each direction, operated out of the local station on the Batavia and Tonawanda branch of the same railroad company, which, known as the Peanut line, was abandoned several years ago. Three westbound trains, passing through Holcomb, West Bloomfield and Ionia in Ontario county enroute to Batavia, left here as early as 6:15 a.m. and as late as 9 p.m. Trains on the same branch line arrived here at 8:20 a.m., 2:10 p.m. and 6:20 p.m.
The Northern Central railroad, now the Pennsylvania, at that time operated six trains in both directions, southbound leaving as early as 9 a.m. and as late as 7 p.m. and north-bound runs terminating runs here at 6:10a.m., 5:53 p.m. and 10:05 p.m.
Also available to local travelers in that year were numerous nearby rail connections now non-existent. A Geneva, via the Syracuse, Corning and Geneva railway, now a freight branch only of the New York Central system, were available four trains south for Corning and also four north for Lyons.
And at Phelps Junction, by way of the Sodus Bay and Southern railroad, now a freight branch of the Pennsylvania company, there were three trains daily south to Stanley and the same number to Sodus Point.
