Editing Canadian Pacific Railway (section)

===1886–1900===
The last spike in the CPR was driven on November 7, 1885, by one of its directors, Donald Smith.<ref name="martin" />

The first transcontinental passenger train departed from [[Montreal]]'s [[Dalhousie Station (Canadian Pacific Railway)|Dalhousie Station]], at Berri Street and Notre Dame Street, at 8&nbsp;pm on June 28, 1886, and arrived at [[Port Moody]] at noon on July 4. This train consisted of two baggage cars, a mail car, one second-class coach, two immigrant sleepers, two first-class coaches, two sleeping cars and a diner (several dining cars were used throughout the journey, as they were removed from the train during the night, with another one added the next morning).<ref>[https://cpconnectingcanada.ca/#building-the-railway CPConnecting Canada, Timeline]. Retrieved 8 July 2022</ref>

By that time, however, the CPR had decided to move its western terminus from Port Moody to [[Granville, British Columbia|Granville]], which was renamed "Vancouver" later that year. The first official train destined for Vancouver arrived on May 23, 1887, although the line had already been in use for three months. The CPR quickly became profitable, and all loans from the federal government were repaid years ahead of time. In 1888, a branch line was opened between [[Greater Sudbury|Sudbury]] and [[Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario|Sault Ste. Marie]] where the CPR connected with the American railway system and its own steamships. That same year, work was started on a line from [[London, Ontario]], to the Canada–US border at [[Windsor, Ontario]]. That line opened on June 12, 1890.<ref>Wilson, Donald M., ''The Ontario & Quebec Railway''. Mika Publishing, Belleville, Ontario (1984). p. 72.<!-- ISBN needed --></ref>

The CPR also leased the [[New Brunswick Railway]] in 1891 for 991 years,<ref name="dormanstoltz">Dorman, Robert and Stoltz, D.E. "A Statutory History of Railways in Canada 1836-1986". The Canadian Institute of Guided Ground Transport, Queen's University, 1987, pp. 109–110, 213, 293, 374, 421.<!-- ISBN needed --></ref> and built the [[International Railway of Maine]], connecting Montreal with [[Saint John, New Brunswick]], in 1889. The connection with Saint John on the Atlantic coast made the CPR the first truly transcontinental railway company in Canada and permitted trans-Atlantic cargo and passenger services to continue year-round when [[sea ice]] in the [[Gulf of St. Lawrence]] closed the port of Montreal during the winter months. By 1896, competition with the [[Great Northern Railway (U.S.)|Great Northern Railway]] for traffic in southern British Columbia forced the CPR to construct a second line across the province, south of the original line.  Van Horne, now president of the CPR, asked for government aid, and the government agreed to provide around $3.6&nbsp;million to construct a railway from [[Lethbridge, Alberta]], through [[Crowsnest Pass]] to the south shore of [[Kootenay Lake]], in exchange for the CPR agreeing to reduce freight rates in perpetuity for key commodities shipped in Western Canada.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Emerson |first=David |date=2015 |title=Pathways: Connecting Canada's Transportation System to the World |url=https://tc.canada.ca/sites/default/files/migrated/ctar_vol1_en.pdf#page=151 |access-date=5 June 2024 |website=Transport Canada}}</ref>[[File:Canadian Pacific First Train.jpg|thumb|First transcontinental train arrives in [[Port Arthur, Ontario|Port Arthur]] on June 30, 1886]]
The controversial Crowsnest Pass Agreement effectively locked the eastbound rate on grain products and westbound rates on certain "settlers' effects" at the 1897 level. Although temporarily suspended during the [[First World War]], it was not until 1983 that the "[[Crow Rate]]" was permanently replaced by the ''[[Western Grain Transportation Act]]'', which allowed the gradual increase of [[grain trade|grain shipping]] prices. The Crowsnest Pass line opened on June 18, 1898, and followed a complicated route through the maze of valleys and passes in southern British Columbia, rejoining the original mainline at [[Hope, British Columbia|Hope]] after crossing the [[Cascade Mountains]] via [[Coquihalla Pass]].<ref>Canadian Pacific Railway, "Prairie & Pacific Regions Subdivision Chart and Historical Record" (1943).<!-- pages?? --></ref>

[[File:Canadian Trans-Continental Railways.jpg|thumb|left|The system in 1906, soon after the construction of the transcontinental railway]]

The Southern Mainline, generally known as the [[Kettle Valley Railway]] in British Columbia, was built in response to the booming mining and smelting economy in southern British Columbia, and the tendency of the local geography to encourage and enable easier access from neighbouring US states than from Vancouver or the rest of Canada, which was viewed to be as much of a threat to national security as it was to the province's control of its own resources. The local passenger service was re-routed to this new southerly line, which connected numerous emergent small cities across the region. Independent railways and subsidiaries that were eventually merged into the CPR in connection with this route were the [[Shuswap and Okanagan Railway]], the [[Kaslo and Slocan Railway]], the [[Columbia and Kootenay Railway]], the [[Columbia and Western Railway]] and various others.<ref name="dormanstoltz"/>

====Settlement of western Canada====
[[File:Land Ticket.jpg|thumb|upright|One of the CPR's land offerings, 1883]]
Under the initial contract with the Canadian government to build the railway, the CPR was granted {{convert|25|e6acres|km2|abbr=off|order=flip}}. Canadian Pacific then began an intense campaign to bring immigrants to Canada; its agents operated in many overseas locations, where immigrants were often sold a package that included passage on a CP ship, travel on a CP train and land sold by the CP railway.  Land was priced at $2.50 an acre and up but required cultivation.<ref>{{cite journal|title=The Canadian Pacific Railway Co|journal=The Week: A Canadian Journal of Politics, Literature, Science and Arts|date=24 January 1884|volume=8|page=127|url=https://archive.org/stream/weekcanadianjour01toro#page/n63/mode/1up}}</ref> To transport immigrants, Canadian Pacific developed a fleet of over a thousand [[Colonist car]]s, low-budget sleeper cars designed to transport immigrant families from eastern Canadian seaports to the west.<ref>Jonathan Hanna, "Colonist Cars Helped Build the West", ''Momentum'' Fall 2008</ref>