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Forth Junction
(once located in South Red Deer) is symbolic of the North-South,
East-West traffic flow of settlement, commerce, industry,
agriculture, transportation
and entrepreneurship in Red Deer and Western Canada
 Forth
Junction
The ACR pier on Taylor Drive
symbolizes Red Deer as the distribution and transportation hub of
Central Alberta
incoming train from the west in 1955
 Forth
Junction (located south of 32 Street along the current Taylor
Drive in Red Deer) was the railway interchange from 1910 to 1962
that connected the east-west Red Deer-based Alberta Central Railway
(ACR) and the north-south Calgary and Edmonton
Railway (C&ER), both operated by Canadian Pacific. The junction represents the
role of the railway as the major evolutionary economic catalyst in the development of Central
Alberta and Western Canada.
The concrete pier along Taylor Drive (the original right of way of
the Calgary & Edmonton Railway) marks the location of the Alberta
Central Railway bridge that once crossed the C & E Railway and
Waskasoo Creek, linking the ACR yard (once located in Mountview
subdivision) and what is now the West Park subdivision eventually
running across the Mintlaw trestle and running west to Sylvan Lake
and Rocky Mountain House.
The eastern leg of the ACR which included the Mountview railyard and
station as well as a timber trestle across Piper Creek at the
present site of Kin Kanyon recreational area, was abandoned by the
Canadian Pacific in 1913, as it already had an eastern link via
Lacombe, Alix and Stettler.
Photos:
Header photo: ACR piers at former CPR line through Red Deer, 1985,
Paul Pettypiece photo
1. Surviving lone ACR pier next to Taylor Drive 2009, Paul
Pettypiece photo
2. Incoming CPR train from Alberta Central subdivision approaching
Forth Junction c1955, Red Deer Archives P6498, location overlay
3. Historic map of Forth Junction (ACR and C&ER) Red Deer, Atlas of
Alberta Railways, University of Alberta Press
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