The Dover & Rockaway River Railroad is a

short-line railroad :''Short Line is also one of the four railroads in the American version of the popular board game Monopoly, named after the Shore Fast Line, an interurban streetcar line.'' A shortline railroad is a small or mid-sized railroad company that opera ...

operating in

Morris County, New Jersey Morris County is a County (United States), county located in the U.S. state of New Jersey, about west of New York City. According to the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, the county's population was enumerated at 509,285,

. On July 1, 2017, it took over operation of three Morris County owned rail lines previously operated by Morristown and Erie. The DRRV is a wholly owned subsidiary of Chesapeake and Delaware, LLC.

Lines

Chester Branch

The former DLW Chester Branch was extended in 1869 to

Chester, New Jersey Chester Borough is a borough in Morris County, New Jersey, United States. As of the 2010 United States Census, the borough's population was 1,649,Conrail Conrail , formally the Consolidated Rail Corporation, was the primary Class I railroad in the Northeastern United States between 1976 and 1999. The trade name Conrail is a portmanteau based on the company's legal name. It continues to do busin ...

planned to abandon the branch line, but Holland Manufacturing and Westinghouse Elevator purchased the line to continue rail services to their facilities. In 2009,

, purchased the line and leased rail operations to M&E. Branching off from Lake Junction, it ends in Succasunna. DRRV freight service uses this line to access the High Bridge Branch at Ferromonte Junction. The line was rehabilitated in 2010 with the use of federal stimulus funds obtained by the line's new owner, Morris County Department of Transportation. Starting in July 2017 the line was leased to DRRV.

Customers

*Holland Manufacturing, Succasunna (adhesives, paper products) *Kuiken Brothers Company, Succasunna (lumber, building materials)

High Bridge Branch

The High Bridge Branch is owned by

, and is leased to DRRV. A former

Central Railroad of New Jersey The Central Railroad of New Jersey, also known as the Jersey Central or Jersey Central Lines , was a Class I railroad with origins in the 1830s. It was absorbed into Conrail in April 1976 along with several other prominent bankrupt railroads of ...

line called the

High Bridge Branch The High Bridge Branch was a branch line of the Central Railroad of New Jersey (CNJ) that started in High Bridge, New Jersey at a connection with the CNJ main line and continued north to iron-ore mines in Morris County. The High Bridge Branch ...

, it splits from the Chester Branch at Ferromonte Junction and heads southwest through Succasunna and

Flanders Flanders (, ; Dutch: ''Vlaanderen'' ) is the Flemish-speaking northern portion of Belgium and one of the communities, regions and language areas of Belgium. However, there are several overlapping definitions, including ones related to culture, ...

. The line ends west of U.S. Route 206 at Bartley Rd. near Flanders. Originally excluded from the Conrail system in 1976, the line remained in service under a subsidy agreement by local authorities as far as Califon until roughly 1980. Around this time, there was talk

New Jersey Transit New Jersey Transit Corporation, branded as NJ Transit, and often shortened to NJT, is a state-owned public transportation system that serves the U.S. state of New Jersey, along with portions of New York State and Pennsylvania. It operates bu ...

would use the line to connect their lines at High Bridge and Lake Junction but the plan fell through. Track removal between High Bridge and Flanders occurred later in 1980, only taking about a year to complete. Morris County purchased the in-service part of the line from the state in 1982.

Customers

*Blue Ridge Lumber, Kenvil ''(Kenvil Team Track)'' (lumber, building materials) *Triumph Plastics, Flanders (plastic)

Dover & Rockaway Branch

Originally the Dover & Rockaway Railroad. The line operates from D&R Junction (where it meets the NJ Transit Morristown Line) in

Wharton Wharton may refer to: Academic institutions * Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania * Wharton County Junior College * Paul R. Wharton High School * Wharton Center for Performing Arts, at Michigan State University Places * Wharton, Ch ...

through downtown

Dover Dover () is a town and major ferry port in Kent, South East England. It faces France across the Strait of Dover, the narrowest part of the English Channel at from Cap Gris Nez in France. It lies south-east of Canterbury and east of Maidstone ...

northeast to Rockaway. The line ends along Green Pond Road in Rockaway Township, north of

Interstate 80 Interstate 80 (I-80) is an east–west transcontinental freeway that crosses the United States from downtown San Francisco, California, to Teaneck, New Jersey, in the New York metropolitan area. The highway was designated in 1956 as one o ...

. This line passes through downtown Dover and Rockaway with many street crossings. Most of the customers on this branch are located in an industrial park along Green Pond Road, at the north end of the branch.

Customers

*C&M Metals, Dover (scrap metal - recycling) *Polyfil, Rockaway (plastics - polymer additives) *Endot, Rockaway (plastics - piping) *TriPak, Rockaway (plastics - packaging) *

84 Lumber 84 Lumber is an operated American building materials supply company. Founded in 1956 by Joseph Hardy, it derives its name from the unincorporated village of Eighty Four, Pennsylvania, a census-designated place south of Pittsburgh, where its ...

, Rockaway (lumber, building materials)

References

{{New Jersey railroads New Jersey railroads Railway companies established in 2017 Companies operating former Central Railroad of New Jersey lines East Amwell Township, New Jersey 2017 establishments in New Jersey