Piece of rail from Halifax construction project given to streetcar buff

Don Artz wrote the book on Halifax's old street railway system literally.

The writer and researcher co-authored two books on the topic. He alsoonce worked as an inspector for the Halifax Transit Corporation, which was thepredecessor toMetro Transit and now Halifax Transit.

Three decades after his retirement, the city is rewarding him for his efforts.

A piece of rail pulled from a construction project has been presented to Artz.

"This worked out so nicely," said Brynn Langille, spokesperson for the Halifax Regional Municipality.

"We were able to grab a piecefrom the construction siteand gift it to someonewho has a vested interest in the history of the tram lines in the city and the municipality."

Trains once ran Quinpool to downtown

Last month, a construction project began on Quinpool Road to replace the bridge over the CN Rail tracks. But that project uncovered other tracks.

The tracks were from a decades-old tram line that connected the Armdalearea to downtown, along with many other routes on the Halifax peninsula.

Langille said the timing was perfect to rescue the segment of rail before it was discarded.

Don Artz'sson, Graeme,reached out on social media when he saw the construction project had revealed rails.

The city noticed and set the segment aside.

"It was very cool to be a part of this and to give him a special piece of Halifax history," said Langille.

Artzonce rode those rails

The section of rail was revealed to Artz and he immediately recognized it.

He explained there were two kinds of rail used. One was for curved sections of track and one for straight sections.

"So, that'd be a straight road rail, right there," Artz said.

He added that when he was eight or nine years old, he used to ride along the section of rail he can now holdin his hands.

"So they [the streetcars] used to fly through QuinpoolRoad," he said. "The operators would just open those cars up, going down the street, bouncing around. They would bounce and you'd think you were on a real carnival ride."

Artz said he first gained an interest in writing about the streetcars when he started working for the city's transit system, and he stumbled upon old documents.

"Igot into some of their logbooks andit just created the inspiration for writing a couple books," he said.

City officials say this small segment is the only section recovered from the project, which has shut down traffic along Quinpool Road.

"Certainly, with projects like this, we all know that they can cause inconveniences for people. So it is certainly cool to be able to open the ground up and see part of history and the way things used to be," Langille said.