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The Belt Line, 1900
(For more Norfolk geography tidbits, click here.)
The Belt Line was a nearly brand new concept at the turn of the 20th century when Stewart wrote about it in his History of Norfolk County and Representative Citizens (p.308). His fascination with its enginuity, fairness, and efficiency overflows, as he writes:
"...Particular notice should be made of the Belt Line for numerous reasons, and the first of these is, that while it has no terminal apparent it has in reality as many as there are railroads terminating in this port. It begins in the middle of the Norfolk & Carolina track and ends in the middle of the Norfolk & Western. It is but six miles in actual length, but unites tens of thousands of miles of railways reaching every section of the country. It is not a passenger thoroughfare, but a freight distributor, yet the private coaches of some of the biggest railway magnates in the land pass over it. It is continued by the New York, Philadelphia and Norfolk at the one end and the Norfolk & Western at the other, and thus forms a link in the semicircle of steel and steam from Port Norfolk or Pinner’s Point to Lambert’s Point or Willoughby Spit. It is the gatherer and distributor of freights for all the roads, one to the other, and has yet a distinct and separate business of its own. Its own equipment is small and is rarely seen on other roads, yet the rolling stock equipment of nearly every other road in the country is to be seen on its tracks. I would not dare say it owned a single freight car, yet probably fully 250 freight cars are hauled over its tracks every working day of the calendar year. At present it is a single-track road but six miles in length, still even now its side tracks, spurs and switches nearly equal its length, and with the continuation of the rapid development of industrial plants along its territory another year, – for the road is yet an infant in years, – will see those same branches and spurs multiplied fourfold...."
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