In 1997, the CNR abandoned their branchline from Gananoque Junction to Gananoque (formerly the Thousand Islands Railway), which put a logjam in the way of a local developer who was trying to build out an industrial park just north of Gananoque. After some frantic casting around trying to find a shortline to buy the line and put it back into service, they bit the bullet, purchased the line, and contracted with the LT&L to operate it.
The industrial park was not terribly successful, but by the mid 2010s there were about 800 cars a year being delivered to or picked up from it and a few other businesses along the line, so the developers could look at it as a business success.
Part of the reason it was a business success is that after the LT&L bought it, they electrified it and brought in one of the Toronto Suburban Railway’s old Baldwin-Westinghouse steeplecabs as motive power. This motor (originally Hamilton & Brantford #4) was painted, at the request of the industrial park, in CPR candy apple red, and lettered as an billboard for the park.
In 2017, the LT&L renewed their operating agreement for another 50 years, so the line is likely to remain in service for the forseeable future.
Almost the entire Thousand Islands Railway route is intact – the current end of the line is at Victoria Street in Gananoque, with the track from there down to the harbour lifted and the line leased to Gananoque for a pedestrian path (the path continues north in a rails-with-trails configuration to just south of Highway 401.)
The town of Gananoque has inquired into operating trams from Gananoque Junction into town, but when the LT&L said they’d be happy to if and only if the town paid wages & insurance and provided a tram, those inquires stopped.