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ARCHIVED - Canada, by Train

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Travel

Railways made land travel available to the masses, much as large sailing ships and steam vessels had done for water travel. The first passenger cars were often no more than flatcars or boxcars, with benches, that ran at about 30 km/h. Passenger trains later improved, but long waits and hazards, such as becoming snowbound or derailed, were not uncommon. Despite this, train travel was the fastest, most comfortable and most reliable mode of long-distance land travel until the age of the automobile and paved roads. In the 1940s, air travel further contributed to the decline of the passenger train.

Brochure of the Canadian Pacific Railway, 1926, with photograph of people on a boarding platform at Windsor station in Montréal Map from brochure of the Canadian Pacific Railway, 1926, showing the transcontinental route, with several photographs

Source

Canadian Pacific Railway, 1926, cover and map

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