The Atlantic Coast Line Railroad's Lakeland—Fort Myers Line was one of the railroad company's secondary main lines in Central and Southwest Florida. It was built incrementally in the late 1800s and early 1900s. Parts of the line are still active today.
Route description
The Lakeland—Fort Myers Line began at the Atlantic Coast Line's Main Line just east of downtown Lakeland. From there, it ran southeast to Bartow. After running though central Bartow, it continued south through Fort Meade, Bowling Green, Wauchula, and Zolfo Springs. At a point near Gardner, it turned southwest and went through Arcadia to Punta Gorda on the Gulf Coast. From Punta Gorda, it continued south along the coast to Fort Myers.
Branches
In later years, the line continued south from Fort Myers to Bonita Springs and Naples. While a continuous line, track south of Fort Myers was classified separately on employee timetables as the Fort Myers Southern Branch. The Fort Myers Southern Branch extended as far south as Marco Island at its greatest extent.
The Lakeland—Fort Myers Line also connected with the Atlantic Coast Line's Bartow Branch, which ran from Bartow northeast through Winter Haven to the Atlantic Coast Line's Main Line at Lake Alfred. Many long-distance passenger trains to Southwest Florida often used the Bartow Branch throughout its history.
History
Lakeland to Charlotte Harbor
The northernmost 14 miles of the line from Lakeland to Bartow were built by the South Florida Railroad in September of 1884. It was the southern leg of the South Florida Railroad's Pemberton Ferry Branch (the northern leg of the branch north of the main line would be part of the High Springs–Lakeland Line). The Bartow Branch was also built by the South Florida Railroad in 1884. South of Bartow, the line was originally the Florida Southern Railway's Charlotte Harbor Division. Both the South Florida Railroad and the Florida Southern Railway eventually became part of Henry B. Plant's system of railroads. Surveying work to determine the route for the Charlotte Harbor Division was accomplished by Punta Gorda civil engineer Albert W. Gilchrist, who would later serve as Florida's 20th governor.
The Florida Southern's Charlotte Harbor Division was completed with its first train to its terminus in Punta Gorda (initially known as Trabue) on July 24, 1886. Plant would go on to open a hotel in Punta Gorda in 1896. This hotel, the Hotel Punta Gorda, would later be owned by Barron Collier (the namesake of nearby Collier County).
Extension to Fort Myers
Charlotte Harbor was Henry Plant's ultimate goal for his railroad system in Florida. Despite owning a hotel in Fort Myers, he had no interest in having the line continue beyond Punta Gorda. Fort Myers was seeking railroad service at the time and had already been established as a city unlike Punta Gorda. After Plant's death in 1899, his heirs would sell his entire system of railroads to the Atlantic Coast Line Railroad (ACL) in 1902 and serving Fort Myers quickly became a top priority for ACL president Henry Walters. Construction commenced promptly on an extension to Fort Myers via Tice, which made it the ACL's first expansion of the former Plant System. The alignment through Tice was selected so the line would cross the wide Caloosahatchee River farther upstream at Beautiful Island, where a series of shorter trestles could be built. The northernmost trestle originally had a steel swing span built by the American Bridge Company to accommodate river traffic. Service up to the Caloosahatchee River commenced in 1903. The first train reached Fort Myers on May 10, 1904, after the completion of the trestles over the river. Fort Myers would remain the southernmost point of the entire Atlantic Coast Line Railroad system until the Florida land boom of the 1920s.
Fort Myers Southern Branch
Once the land boom was underway, the ACL partnered with a number of local businessmen including advertising entrepreneur Barron Collier, who owned large amounts of land in the newly created Collier County. Through this partnership, they acquired the dormant charter of the unbuilt Fort Myers Southern Railroad (which was chartered in 1918 by the Fort Myers Southern Railroad Company) and used it to extend the line from Fort Myers further south into Collier County. The Atlantic Coast Line would designate track south of Fort Myers as the Fort Myers Southern Branch, referencing the line's charter. The line reached Bonita Springs by late 1925 where a depot was built just south of the Imperial River.