Perhaps 20 years back, there was a lumber yard (State Lumber?) in South Sudbury where the ex-NH Lowell branch crossed the B&M Central Mass line that received quite a bit of rail traffic even into the CSX era. The attached photo shows the RoW from the Lowell branch into where the lumber yard used to be which may have been served by B&M orignally (?).
Here's an excerpt from Wikipedia regarding the Framingham and Lowell RR
By the 1960s, the New York, New Haven and Hartford Railroad, like many railroads, was struggling to stay solvent in the face of increased competition from alternate modes of transportation, and so in 1961 it petitioned to be included in the newly formed Penn Central Transportation Company. On December 31, 1968 all of its properties were purchased by Penn Central.[3] Penn Central, however, soon went bankrupt, and on April 1, 1976 it was taken over by Conrail. However, ownership of the former Framingham and Lowell Railroad line was not passed to Conrail, save for a small portion from South Sudbury to Framingham Center, which was named the South Sudbury Industrial Track in 1982; ownership of the line North from South Sudbury to Lowell passed to the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, who contracted with Conrail to provide service.[4] During the 1980s the tracks stretching from South Sudbury to Concord Junction were abandoned, and service was contracted to the Bay Colony Railroad to supply the North Acton-based lumber yards from West Concord.
The present owner, CSX Transportation, took over part of the Conrail system in 1999, including the only remaining active portion of the Framingham and Lowell Railroad which was the South Sudbury Industrial Track (South Sudbury to Framingham Center, a 4.8 mile segment of the Lowell Secondary between the Central Mass right of way in Sudbury and the active Fitchburg Secondary in Framingham. 1.4 miles of the South Sudbury Industrial Track are in the town of Sudbury and 3.4 miles are in the town of Framingham). Service on the line ended on April 13, 2000 when the last CSX train on the South Sudbury Industrial Track derailed off a West spur which led to a lumber yard in Sudbury, this spur is located immediately South of the junction with the East West Central Mass Rail Line right of way (the Boston & Maine Railroad abandoned the Central Mass Branch Rail Line in 1980). In June 2001, CSX applied to the federal Surface Transportation Board (STB) for approval to abandon the line. In October 2001 the STB approved the abandonment, although the town of Sudbury filed notice with the STB to request that abandonment be postponed in order to allow negotiations with CSX for acquisition of the line as a rail trail. On August 2004, CSX had removed the rails and ties, leaving bridges in place in the event a path were built. By late 2005, all of the grade crossings had been removed by the Massachusetts Highway Department. Today, the line is in various stages of being converted into the Bruce Freeman Rail Trail.[5]
