The first Preston and Berlin Railway was a steam-operated railway, opened for operation in 1857. Berlin, Ontario (now Kitchener, Ontario), and Preston, Ontario (now part of Cambridge, Ontario), were only apart, but the route required a bridge over the Grand River.
Berlin's city council awarded the line a subsidy.
The line operated for just three months. Ice flowing down the Grand River damaged piers of its bridge at Doon, Ontario.
The bridge never re-opened.
There were recriminations over the line's failure, and the satisfaction of those who inspected the line, and its bridge. Eventually, in 1863, an act in Canada's Parliament exonerated Berlin City Council. Edward Irving Ferguson acquired the line's assets, because he had held a mortgage on some of the line's property. He sold those assets to the Grand Trunk Railway, on November 14, 1865.
The from Berlin, to the Grand River, at Doon, was incorporated into a route the Grand Trunk built from Berlin to Galt, Ontario.
See also
Preston and Berlin Street Railway
Grand River Railway
Great Western Railway (Ontario) List of Ontario railways