Kentville Railyard

The Kentville railyard was located between the Cornwallis River and Kentville's Main Street. It consisted of a freight yard, terminal tracks, a coach yard and industry spurs. Long a dominant feature in the town of Kentville, the yard was in operation from 1868 until 1993.

The freight yards in Kentville were located south of the the roundhouse and machine shop. The yard tracks fanned out from switches located at the level crossing of West Main Street. The yard tracks in their final form consisted of: four shunting sidings to the north of DAR the mainline, North 1, North 2, North 3 and North 4; and four shunting tracks located to the south of the mainline, South 1, South 2, South 3 and South 4. The freight yard also contained the Kentville Track Scale. A siding and lead track connected the various yard tracks.

North of the freight yard, a ladder track provided access to the terminal tracks serving the various DAR shops, such as the turntable and roundhouse, machine shop, car shop, repair shop, the Kentville Water Tower and Kentville Coaling Tower. A coach yard was located between the car shop and the station with several spurs serviced by steam lines to heat stored passenger cars. The ladder track led to the Cornwallis River Bridge and continued as the Kingsport Subdivision. Spurs serving various industries led off the yard track at various points, most significantly, the "Back Road Spur" which served multiple industries along River Street.

Evolution of the Yard

As first built by the Windsor and Annapolis Railway in 1869, the yard covered about 7 to 8 acres and had eight tracks. They were the main line; a through siding; a track for loading and discharging; a "Hospital siding" for broken cars; a "dead siding" for scrapping or storing cars; a siding into the Engine Shed and two tracks into the Car Shop.^[1]

The yard was expanded in stages by filling of the meadows along the Cornwallis River.

DAR railyard in Kentville, 1950s.

Bird's Eve View of Kentville Nova Scotia 1879‎‎: detail showing W&AR Kentville Railyard, 1879.

Track schematic for Kentville, circa 1920.

DAR railyard in Kentville, 1970s.

D.A.R. railyard in Kentville on June 21, 1987.

Kentville including D.A.R. railyard.

D.A.R. railyard in Kentville, 1974. This drawing is difficult to read but is proportionately correct and was scanned at 200 DPI. The images below although not proportionally correct because they appeared photographed, not scanned, are the same map in sections and very readable with additional notes to explain some of the original notations on the map. The two buildings immediatley east of the roundhouse are the machine shop and blacksmith shop.

Railyard in sections

The above drawing is difficult to read but is proportionately correct and was scanned at 200 DPI. These images although not proportionally correct because they appeared photographed, not scanned, are the same map as above in sections and very readable with additional notes to explain some of the original notations on the map.

These images are just begging to be put on CAD. If anyone can help this way or advise what the proper way to set up a CAD file for land mapping is so others can do the tracing, please let us know. See this message thread on our forum: http://dardpi.ca/Forum/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=18#p49