The Shay locomotive was designed to be used in a resource setting. Resource railways are one type of industrial line constructed to permit the removal of natural resources from remote areas to either processing centres or more centralized transfer points. The mining and forestry industries are two fields best known for their early reliance on railways to transport raw natural resources from remote areas. In the British Columbia forestry industry, railways were used to transport timber up until the 1950s, when they were replaced by logging roads and trucks.
Forestry railways were comparatively short-lived lines that were built cheaply and frequently below the standards of mainline railways. The tracks were characterized by sharp curves and steep grades that matched local terrain and the logging company's limited budget rather than rigid railway standards. These lines served as feeders to more central loading areas where the rough logs that had been transported on simple log cars were loaded onto more substantial flat cars pulled by conventional locomotives or moved by water to mills for processing.
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