Newfoundland
Construction on the 3 ft 6 in (1,067 mm) Newfoundland Railway began in 1881 and continued on amid recrimination and lawsuits until the line crossed the island to the ferry port at Port aux Basques in 1898. Since no roads existed, it was an economic life-line for the island to the rest of North America, but it chronically lost money. The Newfoundland government took it over in 1923, and the Canadian government transferred it to Canadian National Railways (CNR) when Newfoundland became part of Canada in 1949.
After the Trans-Canada Highway was completed across Newfoundland in 1965, trucks took most of its freight service in the same year as CN instituted the first railcar ferry service to the island. Standard-gauge cars had their trucks switched to narrow gauge for movement on the island. Interchange with the North American system did not improve the traffic levels and even the CNR started to move its own freight increasingly by truck. The death knell came for both the Newfoundland and P.E.I. Railways in 1987 when Canada deregulated its railway industry and allowed railways to abandon money-losing lines.
The Newfoundland Railway was the longest narrow gauge system in North America at the time of its abandonment in September 1988. It was also the last commercial common carrier narrow gauge railway in Canada, since the White Pass & Yukon had closed earlier in the decade.
Read more about this topic: Narrow Gauge Railways In Canada