Built in 1892, the Aransas Harbor Terminal Railroad, known as the Old Terminal Railroad, carried rock from mainland quarries to jetties under construction in the pass. In 1909, the Aransas Pass Channel and Dock Company was chartered to build a channel from Harbor Island, the first South Texas deep water port, to Aransas Pass. As the channel was dredged, displaced sediment was piled along one side and became the basis for a railroad bed. Opened in 1912, the new terminal railroad ran along that roadbed and a series of eight trestles, connected with the San Antonio and Aransas Pass Railroad in Aransas Pass, and became an important tool for shipping cotton. Passenger service began with the Toonerville Trolley, passenger coaches pulled by a converted Model T Ford truck, which carried workers from the mainland to a new shipyard on Harbor Island during World War I. After Corpus Christi was designated a deep water port in 1922, business declined for Harbor Island and the railroad. In 1931, the rail line was converted to a road for automobiles, and that road was replaced by a new highway in 1960. Hurricanes in 1961 and 1970 left few visible remnants of the terminal railroad.