That's a good question Vern The Owner wants to hold onto it as long as he can in hopes the market changes and there becomes a need for it agen hes a business man as well:
Here a quote form the news add:
Area officials want details but see possibilities
If anybody wants to fire up the Windsor Junction rail line, they have until April 8 to alert the Canadian National Railway Co.
The railway published a notice of discontinuance Tuesday that raises questions about the future of the rail corridor between Windsor Junction, in Halifax Regional Municipality, and a location near the Town of Windsor.
The announcement regarding the rail link had some officials in Windsor and Wolfville scratching their heads about the implications.
“There is some uncertainty at this point about which particular properties, if any, are involved within the town,” Bill Butler, director of planning for Windsor, said in an interview.
The notice from CN said the railway wants to see proposals before April 8 for the operation of a railway between Windsor Junction and a spot at mile 31.6, where the line connects with one owned by the Windsor and Hantsport Railway Co.
“Parties interested in acquiring this railway line for the purpose of continuing railway operations must make their intention known,” said a notice published by CN in The Chronicle Herald.
There has been talk in recent years of a tourism-related rail service for the Windsor and Hantsport railway, said David Hovell, executive director of the Wolfville Business Development Corp.
“The loss of a connection with Windsor Junction may have implications,” he said.
Bob Schmidt, CEO of the Windsor and Hantsport Railway, which runs through Wolfville, said the potential loss of the Windsor Junction line is a major concern for his business.
“There is not currently any traffic on the line but that could change at any time,” Schmidt said in an interview from Alexandria, W.Va.
He said there has not been been any traffic on his railway since 2009, amid the demise of the local gypsum industry, but there are encouraging signs that may change.
The situation is similar with the Windsor Junction line, he said.
“The critical thing from our perspective is that the Windsor Junction line be preserved.”
Schmidt said that while the scrap value of the steel in the Windsor Junction line would be worth about $800,000, the going cost for building railway lines these days is about a million dollars per mile.
“Once it’s gone, it’s gone,” he said of the line.
Schmidt said he tried to purchase or lease the Windsor Junction line from CN last year, just to keep it available, but the two parties could not reach mutually agreeable terms.
A decision on the future of the line will come about six months after the April 6 deadline.
CN spokesman Jim Feeney said the line has not been used in about three years.
“If there are no proposals to run a railway, the line will be offered to the federal or provincial government, or perhaps to the municipal governments involved,” he said.
Abandoned railway lines in Nova Scotia have often been successfully converted to multi-purpose trails.
After that I hard nothing more about is if these is its been keeped under lock and key by CN & WHRC.
