The Michigan Central Railway Tunnel is a

railroad Rail transport (also known as train transport) is a means of transport that transfers passengers and goods on wheeled vehicles running on rails, which are incorporated in tracks. In contrast to road transport, where the vehicles run on a pre ...

tunnel under the

Detroit River The Detroit River flows west and south for from Lake St. Clair to Lake Erie as a strait in the Great Lakes system. The river divides the metropolitan areas of Detroit, Michigan, and Windsor, Ontario, Windsor, Ontario—an area collectively refe ...

connecting

Detroit Detroit ( , ; , ) is the largest city in the U.S. state of Michigan. It is also the largest U.S. city on the United States–Canada border, and the seat of government of Wayne County. The City of Detroit had a population of 639,111 at th ...

Michigan Michigan () is a state in the Great Lakes region of the upper Midwestern United States. With a population of nearly 10.12 million and an area of nearly , Michigan is the 10th-largest state by population, the 11th-largest by area, and the ...

, in the United States with

Windsor, Ontario Windsor is a city in southwestern Ontario, Canada, on the south bank of the Detroit River directly across from Detroit, Michigan, United States. Geographically located within but administratively independent of Essex County, it is the souther ...

, in Canada. The U.S. entrance is south of Porter and Vermont streets near Rosa Parks Boulevard. The Canadian entrance is south of Wyandotte Street West between Cameron and Wellington Avenues. It was built by the Detroit River Tunnel Company for the

Canada Southern Railway The Canada Southern Railway , also known as CSR, was a railway in southwestern Ontario, Canada, founded on February 28, 1868 as the Erie and Niagara Extension Railway. Its name was changed to Canada Southern Railway on December 24, 1869. The 1868 ...

, leased by the

Michigan Central Railroad The Michigan Central Railroad (reporting mark MC) was originally incorporated in 1846 to establish rail service between Detroit, Michigan, and St. Joseph, Michigan. The railroad later operated in the states of Michigan, Indiana, and Illinois in ...

and owned by the

New York Central Railroad The New York Central Railroad was a railroad primarily operating in the Great Lakes and Mid-Atlantic regions of the United States. The railroad primarily connected greater New York and Boston in the east with Chicago and St. Louis in the Midw ...

. The tunnel opened in 1910 and is still in use today by the

Canadian Pacific Railway The Canadian Pacific Railway (french: Chemin de fer Canadien Pacifique) , also known simply as CPR or Canadian Pacific and formerly as CP Rail (1968–1996), is a Canadian Class I railway incorporated in 1881. The railway is owned by Canadi ...

History

Background

PostcardDetroitMIElectricMotorEmergingTunnelDetroitRiver1911

Prior to the construction of the tunnel, the

had several connections to

at its west end, all

train ferries A train ferry is a ship (ferry) designed to carry railway vehicles. Typically, one level of the ship is fitted with railway tracks, and the vessel has a door at the front and/or rear to give access to the wharves. In the United States, train f ...

. The northern one ran across the

St. Clair River The St. Clair River (french: Rivière Sainte-Claire) is a U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline dataThe National Map accessed November 7, 2011 river in central North America which flows from Lake Huron int ...

, connecting to the St. Clair and Western Railroad. The southern connection crossed the

south of

, connecting to the Canada Southern Bridge Company at Grosse Ile. Additionally a branch (usually considered the main line) split from the line to Grosse Ile at

Essex Essex () is a county in the East of England. One of the home counties, it borders Suffolk and Cambridgeshire to the north, the North Sea to the east, Hertfordshire to the west, Kent across the estuary of the River Thames to the south, and G ...

, running to the

Windsor Windsor may refer to: Places Australia * Windsor, New South Wales ** Municipality of Windsor, a former local government area * Windsor, Queensland, a suburb of Brisbane, Queensland **Shire of Windsor, a former local government authority around Wi ...

. In 1891, the

Grand Trunk Railway The Grand Trunk Railway (; french: Grand Tronc) was a railway system that operated in the Canadian provinces of Quebec and Ontario and in the American states of Connecticut, Maine, Michigan, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and Vermont. The rai ...

opened the

St. Clair Tunnel The St. Clair Tunnel is the name for two separate rail tunnels which were built under the St. Clair River between Sarnia, Ontario and Port Huron, Michigan. The original, opened in 1891 and used until it was replaced by a new larger tunnel in 1995, ...

Port Huron Port Huron is a city in the U.S. state of Michigan and the county seat of St. Clair County. The population was 30,184 at the 2010 census. The city is adjacent to Port Huron Township but is administered separately. Located along the St. Clair ...

, giving it an advantage over the Canada Southern and its car ferries. The Detroit River Tunnel Company was formed August 15, 1905, as a merger of the Michigan and Canada Bridge and Tunnel Company (in

) and the Canada and Michigan Bridge and Tunnel Company (in

Ontario Ontario ( ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada.Ontario is located in the geographic eastern half of Canada, but it has historically and politically been considered to be part of Central Canada. Located in Central Ca ...

Construction

Construction began in October 1906 under the engineering supervision of the New York Central Railway's engineering vice president,

William J. Wilgus William J. Wilgus (1865–1949) was an American civil engineer. In 1902 he was responsible for the design and construction of New York City's Grand Central Terminal. Wilgus coined the term "taking wealth from the air" from his idea to lease the ...

. Dredging to construct the tunnel was performed in part by

Dunbar & Sullivan Dunbar () is a town on the North Sea coast in East Lothian in the south-east of Scotland, approximately east of Edinburgh and from the English border north of Berwick-upon-Tweed. Dunbar is a former royal burgh, and gave its name to an ecc ...

, who used a steel dredge (''Tipperary Boy'') to carry out the work. The Michigan Central Railway Tunnel opened for passenger service July 26, 1910. Freight service began September 15 and on October 16 all traffic began running via the tunnel, ending the use of a train car ferry. From opening it was operated by the

under lease of December 19, 1906. It was the first

immersed tube An immersed tube (or immersed tunnel) is a kind of undersea tunnel composed of segments, constructed elsewhere and floated to the tunnel site to be sunk into place and then linked together. They are commonly used for road and rail crossings of r ...

tunnel to carry traffic. On the east (Canadian) side, the tunnel connected to the line that had served a train ferry at

. On the west (U.S.) side, the tunnel connected to the

main line west of downtown (later abandoned east of the junction), and the

Michigan Central Station Michigan Central Station (also known as Michigan Central Depot or MCS) is the historic former main intercity passenger rail station in Detroit, Michigan. Built for the Michigan Central Railroad, it replaced the original depot in downtown Detroit ...

was built west of the junction, opening in 1913.

Ownership changes

In 1968, the tunnel passed from the

Penn Central The Penn Central Transportation Company, commonly abbreviated to Penn Central, was an American Railroad classes, class I railroad that operated from 1968 to 1976. Penn Central combined three traditional corporate rivals (the Pennsylvania Railroad ...

, and in 1976 to

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 ...

. In 1985, Conrail sold the tunnel to the

Canadian National Railway The Canadian National Railway Company (french: Compagnie des chemins de fer nationaux du Canada) is a Canadian Class I freight railway headquartered in Montreal, Quebec, which serves Canada and the Midwestern and Southern United States. CN i ...

and

, with each getting a half share.Trackside Guide No. 3 - Detroit,

Trains In rail transport, a train (from Old French , from Latin , "to pull, to draw") is a series of connected vehicles that run along a railway track and transport people or freight. Trains are typically pulled or pushed by locomotives (often know ...

, June 2003 The north tube underwent a $27 million enlargement in 1993 to allow passage of certain types of modern rail cars such as those with stacked containers and auto carriers, which had been previously ferried across the Detroit River. However, the enlarged tunnel can still not accommodate the largest rail cars, such as those with stacked 9 ft 6 in "high-cube" shipping containers. In early 2000, CN agreed to sell its stake to Borealis Transportation Infrastructure Trust (a venture of the Ontario Municipal Employees Retirement System) and use only the

. CP and Borealis vested the tunnel into the new Detroit River Tunnel Partnership, and plans were announced to construct a new railway tunnel and convert the existing railway tunnel to a two-lane free flow truckway for

transport truck A truck or lorry is a motor vehicle designed to transport cargo, carry specialized payloads, or perform other utilitarian work. Trucks vary greatly in size, power, and configuration, but the vast majority feature body-on-frame construction ...

s to alleviate pressure at the other nearby international border crossings (

Ambassador Bridge The Ambassador Bridge is a tolled international suspension bridge across the Detroit River that connects Detroit, Michigan, United States, with Windsor, Ontario, Canada. Opened in 1929, it is the busiest international border crossing in North ...

, Detroit-Windsor Tunnel, and the Detroit-Windsor Truck Ferry). In June 2009, CP announced the sale part of its interest in the partnership, so that Borealis held 83.5% and CP held 16.5%. In 2010, the Windsor Port Authority, Borealis Infrastructure, and Canadian Pacific announced plans to construct a new rail tunnel compatible with double-stacked trains. The initiative, called the Continental Rail Gateway, was scrapped in 2015, upon the approval of the proposed

Gordie Howe International Bridge The Gordie Howe International Bridge (french: Pont International Gordie-Howe), known during development as the Detroit River International Crossing and the New International Trade Crossing, is a cable-stayed international bridge across the Det ...

. Canadian Pacific took full ownership of the tunnel in December 2020 following an approximate US$312 million deal with OMERS. Amidst its merger negotiations with 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 ...

, Canadian Pacific agreed in early 2022 that

Amtrak The National Railroad Passenger Corporation, Trade name, doing business as Amtrak () , is the national Passenger train, passenger railroad company of the United States. It operates inter-city rail service in 46 of the 48 contiguous United Stat ...

would be allowed to access the tunnel for passenger service as part of the terms of the merger. This followed three years of efforts by Amtrak to restore Detroit-to-Toronto passenger rail service.

Gallery

File:Detroit River Train Tunnel.jpg, November 2010 File:Detroit River Train Tunnel 2.JPG, A closer view File:Detroit River Train Tunnel 3.JPG, A train entering the tunnel

References

Railroad History Database
{{Crossings navbox , structure = Crossings , place =

, bridge = Michigan Central Railway Tunnel , bridge signs = ''Canadian Pacific Railway'' , upstream =

, upstream signs = , downstream =