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1902–1906
The railroad that crossed Roseland's ground began as the South Bend and Southern Michigan Railway. The company was consolidated on 15 September 1902, successor through consolidation to a Michigan company of the same name and to the South Bend and Northern Railway, both then under construction, with capital of $750,000. Service began on 3 August 1903, and by 1905 the line ran South Bend to Niles, eleven miles, with hourly passenger service. On 7 February 1906 it merged into the Southern Michigan Railway Company. Through service to St. Joseph began on 16 May 1906. The line sold itself on the Michigan fruit country it crossed: CERA calls it the "Fruit Belt Route," and its own 1907 timetable brands the service the "Peach Belt Way," pricing the through journey South Bend–Niles–Buchanan–Berrien Springs–St. Joseph. Its cars carried freight as well as passengers — box motors worked out of the South Bend freight house, and an express car ran for the fast transit of Michigan fruit. One date in this course is carried two ways in the record — a Michigan railroad timeline dates the line's completion to Niles to 1905 against the 1903 first operation both CERA and Marlette print — and the pair stands unmerged in the pass register (C46); this section prints 1903 as the first operation.
Sources: Marlette, Electric Railroads of Indiana (1959), Southern Michigan Railway Co. entry, verbatim consolidation and merger lines; CERA Bulletin 104, the August 3, 1903 and May 16, 1906 operation dates and the 1907 public timetable with its June 11, 1907 fare table; MichiganRailroads.com timeline, the 1905 completion limb of C46.