Comrie railway station

The Lochearnhead, St Fillans and Comrie Railway company was formed to build a line along the picturesque valley of Strathearn, closing the gap between the Callander and Oban line of the Caledonian Railway and Crieff. Tourism was on the increase in the area, and there were ambitious ideas that imported goods traffic at Oban would be routed to the eastern Scotland towns and cities over the line.

The route was opened in stages between 1901 and 1905; raising finance was a serious difficulty, but in the end the Caledonian Railway took over.

The through goods traffic never materialised and the tourist trade never provided enough income for the line to be profitable, and it closed in 1951.

The large tract of country in the Western Highlands of Scotland was penetrated by the Callander and Oban Railway which intended to open up the area and regenerate the port of Oban. They found the cost of construction strecthed their financial resources much further than they imagined, but the line was opened in stages, reaching a Killin station at Glenoglehead in 1871, and finally reaching Oban in 1880. As well as the ordinary commercial traffic of the districts served, tourism became a significant seasonal source of income, and the attractive scenery became the focus of great interest.

To the east of Strathearn, Crieff had been reached much earlier by the Crieff Junction Railway, in 1856, connecting the town, which was the second most populous in Perthshire, in 1856. A second rail connection from Perth via Methven, the Crieff and Methven Junction Railway, opened in 1867. The line was extended a few miles west to Comrie when the Crieff and Comrie Railway opened in 1893. This improved the commercial activity of Comrie, and encouraged tourist exploration of Strathearn by road, using Comrie as a railhead. However the remaining gap of 15 miles (22 km) between Comrie and Lochearnhead proved an attraction to those who proposed railways, and a number of ideas that foresaw extraordinary business potential if the Callander and Oban line were connected to Crieff: transatlantic goods traffic would, it was claimed, be landed at Oban and conveyed to the eastern side of Scotland over such a line.

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Wikipedia