Carlton Trail Railway

The Carlton Trail Railway (CTRW) is a regional railway operating the Meadow Lake, Big River, and Blaine Lake subdivisions, from Meadow Lake to Speers Junction. CTRW also operates the Warman subdivision from a point north of Prince Albert to Warman, and the part of the Tisdale subdivision from Prince Albert to Birch Hills. In addition, it operates the Arborfield subdivision in the northeast grain belt. In all, CTRW operates 475 km of track in Saskatchewan; all of these lines were formerly CN branch lines. CTRW, a subsidiary of Denver-based OmniTRAX, began its Saskatchewan operations in December 1997. Its major customers are the forest products companies around Prince Albert and Meadow Lake, which move pulp, paper, oriented strand board, and lumber. For the agriculture industry, CTRW serves Grain Elevators, producer car loading sites, and grain processing plants scattered across all its lines. OmniTRAX also owns the Hudson Bay Railway, which operates to the prairie port of Churchill; grain for Churchill comes mostly from northeastern Saskatchewan.

Paul Beingessner