Founded in 2001, Meridian Southern Railway , in east

Mississippi Mississippi () is a state in the Southeastern region of the United States, bordered to the north by Tennessee; to the east by Alabama; to the south by the Gulf of Mexico; to the southwest by Louisiana; and to the northwest by Arkansas. Miss ...

USA The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...

, is a short line freight railroad linking

Meridian Meridian or a meridian line (from Latin ''meridies'' via Old French ''meridiane'', meaning “midday”) may refer to Science * Meridian (astronomy), imaginary circle in a plane perpendicular to the planes of the celestial equator and horizon * ...

, and

Waynesboro, Mississippi Waynesboro is a city in Wayne County, Mississippi, United States. The population was 5,043 at the 2010 census. It is the county seat of Wayne County. Geography Waynesboro is located at (31.674026, -88.643553), just east of the Chickasawhay Rive ...

and intermediate stations. The railroad is connected to the national rail network by its connection to the

Kansas City Southern Railway The Kansas City Southern Railway Company is an American Class I railroad. Founded in 1887, it operates in 10 midwestern and southeastern U.S. states: Illinois, Missouri, Kansas, Oklahoma, Arkansas, Tennessee, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana and ...

at Meridian. The MDS utilizes five

General Electric General Electric Company (GE) is an American multinational conglomerate founded in 1892, and incorporated in New York state and headquartered in Boston. The company operated in sectors including healthcare, aviation, power, renewable en ...

built B23-7 locomotives to move over 7,000 carloads of freight annually. Originally, this line was part of the

Mobile and Ohio Railroad The Mobile and Ohio Railroad was a railroad in the Southern U.S. The M&O was chartered in January and February 1848 by the states of Alabama, Kentucky, Mississippi, and Tennessee. It was planned to span the distance between the seaport of Mobil ...

mainline connecting Mobile, Alabama with

St. Louis, Missouri St. Louis () is the second-largest city in Missouri, United States. It sits near the confluence of the Mississippi and the Missouri Rivers. In 2020, the city proper had a population of 301,578, while the bi-state metropolitan area, which e ...

. The segment between Waynesboro and Mobile has been abandoned. At one time MDS was affiliated with the Owego Harford Railway, the

Lehigh Railway The Lehigh Railway is a shortline railroad in Wyoming County and Bradford County, Pennsylvania. It connects to the Reading Blue Mountain and Northern Railroad in Mehoopany and to Norfolk Southern in Athens, just south of Sayre. It operates a ...

, and the Luzerne and Susquehanna Railway), all part of a holding company headquartered in

Owego, New York Owego is a town in Tioga County, New York, United States. The population was 18,728 at the 2020 census. The name is derived from the Iroquois word ''Ahwaga'', meaning "where the valley widens". Owego is in the southeastern corner of the cou ...

. The other three lines were sold to

R.J. Corman Railroad Group R. J. Corman Railroad Group, LLC is a privately owned railroad services and short line operating company headquartered in Nicholasville, KY, with field locations in 22 states. It was owned by Richard J. Corman, who established the company in ...

in August 2020, leaving MDS as the sole remaining operation.

External links

*http://www.meridiansouthern.com/ Mississippi railroads Spin-offs of the Kansas City Southern Railway Companies operating former Gulf, Mobile and Ohio Railroad lines {{Mississippi-transport-stub