Murphy Branch

It opened up the isolated and rural mountains west of Asheville to the outside world, allowing easy travel and improved commerce.

In the 1980s, Norfolk Southern decided to close the Murphy Branch west of Sylva because of declining freight traffic.

In April 2014, Norfolk Southern announced that it would be selling the Asheville-Dillsboro leg of the Murphy Branch to Watco, a short-line railroad headquartered in Pittsburg, Kansas.

A new North Carolina Limited Liability Company was established and named the Blue Ridge Southern Railroad to manage this.

Chemicals used in the making of epsom salt are delivered to Premier Magnesia (formerly Giles Chemical) in Waynesville, and the paper mill's closure led to the largest epsom salt supplier in the Americas getting help from Haywood County to deal with the rail service cutbacks and prevent the company from leaving after 70 years.

A former Southern Railway depot in Bryson City, North Carolina , now serving as the main headquarter of the Great Smoky Mountains Railroad (GSMR)
The Waynesville Train Depot sometime in the 1890s