The West Bloomfield Trail follows former railway routes that once served the region’s agriculture, industry, communities, and tourism. In the 1880s, the Grand Trunk Railroad built a rail line through the area, and in 1899 a light rail electric trolley track was added, visible at Cass Lake Road, linking Pontiac, Farmington, and Detroit before later becoming part of the Detroit United Railway. The trail follows the side-by-side paths of the trolley track and Grand Trunk rail as far as Orchard Lake Road, and the broader corridor reflects a transportation network that also included the Pontiac & Sylvan Lake Rail Co., built in 1895 to carry visitors and investors from Pontiac to the Sylvan Lake Inn and new subdivisions. In the early 1900s, trolleys and automobiles brought many visitors to the lakes of Oakland County, helping tourist facilities such as weekend boarding houses grow, while the trolley line beside the Grand Trunk route was eventually removed in 1929.