Grand Trunk Pacific Railway

The Grand Trunk Pacific Railway [ gɹænd tɹʌŋk pəsɪfɪk ɹeɪlweɪ ] is a former railway company in Canada. The company was founded in 1903 to develop the area west of Winnipeg in Manitoba through the prairie areas and over the Rocky Mountains to the Pacific coast to Prince Rupert. She was a subsidiary of the Grand Trunk Railway. Together with the National Transcontinental Railway east of Winnipeg, they should form a successful competition with Canadian Pacific Railway.

The construction was supervised by Charles M. Hays, who was appointed in 1904 as President of the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway in 1910 and rose to become president of the entire Grand Trunk Railway. The 4800 km long route was completed in 1914. It ran from Winnipeg via Saskatoon, Edmonton, Jasper and the Yellowhead Pass. The company also operated side routes to Regina and Calgary and steamship connections from Prince Rupert to Vancouver, Victoria, Seattle and Alaska.

In economic terms, it was inferior to the more in the south running line of the Canadian Pacific Railway. The expected high passenger traffic failed to materialize. Shortly after the outbreak of the First World War, the company ran into financial difficulties. The Canadian government took over in 1919 the control of the company. In 1923 she was finally by the Canadian National Railway (formerly Canadian National Railways ) absorbed, which operates most of its route network to this day. The former railway route through the Yellowhead Pass later formed the basis for the construction of the Yellowhead Highway.