Misplaced Pages

#977022

90-528: One result of the 1837 updates of omnibus transportation bills called the Main Line of Public Works (1824), the legislation was undertaken with an eye to enhance and better connect eastern settlement's business interests with newer mid-western territories rapidly undergoing population explosions in the Pre–Civil War era. But those manufactories needed a source of heat, and Coal Region of Northeastern Pennsylvania

180-501: A navigational canal that would allow deep keeled coastal ships to reach docks and pickup and transship coal down the Lehigh Canal (which White had full ownership of by 1818 ) to Easton, Pennsylvania . An employee of White's had figured out how to get "Rock Coal" to burn properly during the War of 1812 renewing serious interest in exploiting these relatively untapped coal resources within

270-433: A water wheel . In a gravity balance system two parallel tracks are employed with ascending trains on one and descending trains on the adjacent track. A single cable is attached to both trains, wound round a winding drum at the top of the incline to provide braking. The weight of the loaded descending cars is used to lift the ascending empties. This form of cable railway can only be used to move loads downhill and requires

360-486: A 36-mile (58 km) route that included 11 levels, 10 inclined planes fitted with stationary engines that could raise and lower boats and cargo, a 900-foot (270 m), viaduct over the Little Conemaugh River , and many bridges. Infrastructure included 153 drains and culverts . The railroad climbed 1,398 feet (426 m) from the eastern canal basin at Hollidaysburg and 1,171 feet (357 m) from

450-644: A Railroad to be constructed at the expense of the state and to be styled "The Pennsylvania Railroad" (Act of March 24, 1828, Pamph. Laws, p. 221) . Begun with Navigations construction along the Susquehanna and the West Fork of the Susquehanna with surveys for the best route over the barrier of the northern Allegheny Mountains , the system in time ran from Philadelphia on the Delaware estuary westwards across

540-851: A canal by the Philadelphia and Columbia Railroad at historic Wright's Ferry . Engineers faced complications at the northern end of the Eastern Division Canal, where it met the Juniata Division Canal and the Susquehanna Division Canal at Duncan's Island. Boats had to cross from one side of the Susquehanna River to the other between either the Susquehanna Division or the Juniata Division on the west side and

630-714: A canal system and later added railroads. Built between 1826 and 1834, it established the Pennsylvania Canal System and the Allegheny Portage Railroad . Later amendments substituted a new technology, railroads , in place of the planned but costly 82-mile (132 km) canal connecting the Delaware River in Philadelphia to the Susquehanna River . The route from Philadelphia to Pittsburgh remained

720-484: A change in elevation of 584 feet (178 m) over the full length of the canal, which opened in 1832. From the canal basin, westbound boats began their journey by being elevated about 10 feet (3 m) by a lock that brought them to the level of a wooden aqueduct on which they were towed 600 feet (183 m) to the south side of the Juniata. At North's Island, 18 miles (29 km) from the Susquehanna, they were towed by

810-826: A halt under an 1812 embargo. Industrialists in Philadelphia pressed for some solution to their foundries' fuel needs and by year's end, legislation was on the books for improving the Schuylkill River into the Schuylkill Canal . But this project was underfunded, and other canals were completed first, including the Lehigh Canal in late 1820 and the Erie Canal in 1821. By mid-decade canal projects and some railroads were being proposed, organized, chartered, and built in Pennsylvania and other northeast seaboard states. In 1823, Pennsylvania industrialist Josiah White proposed creating

900-423: A horizontal platform on which the slate wagons rode. This is a variant of the gravity balance incline that can be used to move loads uphill. A water tank is attached to the descending train. The tank is filled with water until the combined weight of the filled tank and train is greater than the weight of the loaded train that will be hauled uphill. The water is either carried in an additional water wagon attached to

990-675: A moving barney. In the 1860s, the LH&;S completed tracks along the right bank of the Lehigh through the Lehigh Gorge to Mauch Chunk, now Jim Thorpe , and its trackage to the Delaware Valley , especially the Delaware Canal to Philadelphia markets and rail connections at Easton via the industrial centers of Allentown and Bethlehem, Pennsylvania . These inclined plane railbeds were used for

SECTION 10

#1732851557978

1080-643: A patchwork of canals and railroads until the Pennsylvania Railroad was built in the 1850s. Trans-Appalachian settlement had begun in earnest during the latter years of the French and Indian War (1754-1763). Following the war, the British government made several agreements, primarily with the Iroquois , which resulted in official policies to curb the expansion of settlement in the colonial West (today's Midwest). This

1170-603: A separate amending act, the state authorized the Delaware Canal, which was delayed for a few more years costing LC&N many dollars, until it was finally dug alongside, and generally in sight of the Delaware River between Easton down river to Bristol. When completed in 1832 by the state it also didn't work—having leaking issues and water supply problems like those that plagued the Union Canal and Schuylkill Navigation, and

1260-637: A two-square-mile (5.2 km ) reservoir. Dubbed Lake Conemaugh , it supplied water to the Western Division Canal. When canal traffic declined, the lake and dam were abandoned, then sold to the Pennsylvania Railroad in 1857; the railroad in turn sold them to private interests. They were purchased by the South Fork Fishing and Hunting Club in 1879, and a private resort was built surrounding the lake. On May 31, 1889, following heavy rains,

1350-409: A water powered continuous rope to the north side of the river across a slack water pool formed by a dam. From North's Island to Huntingdon, the river was dammed in three more places to feed water to the canal, and above Huntingdon, 14 more dams were needed to create 16 miles (26 km) of slack water navigation in the river to supplement 22 miles (35 km) of travel in segments of canal. In addition,

1440-585: A wider space than a stationary engine-driven incline, but has the advantage of not requiring external power, and therefore costs less to operate. A variation of the gravity balance incline was the trwnc incline found at slate quarries in north Wales , notably the Dinorwic Quarry and several in Blaenau Ffestiniog . These were worked by gravity, but instead of the wagons running on their own wheels, permanently attached angled wagons were used that had

1530-404: A winch, clutch and brake. A helper spotted cars below a short local drop to an area upslope of the 'barney house', where the cable and pusher cart would drop into on one end (heading down) and rise out of on the other to engage the freight cars and push them upwards. The axle on the barneys telescoped so that at the barney house entrance the barney's wheels slide inside and dropped under the plane of

1620-480: Is a pamphlet written for The City History Society of Philadelphia and read at the meeting of March 15, 1921. Download coordinates as: Cable railroad A cable railway is a railway that uses a cable , rope or chain to haul trains. It is a specific type of cable transportation . The most common use for a cable railway is to move vehicles on a steeply graded line that is too steep for conventional locomotives to operate on – this form of cable railway

1710-440: Is most commonly used for a temporary incline where setting up the infrastructure of a winding drum and stationary engine is not appropriate. It is similarly employed for recovery operations where derailed rolling stock must be hauled back to the permanent track. While the majority of cable railways moved trains over steep inclines, there are examples of cable-haulage on railways that did not have steep grades. The Glasgow Subway

1800-496: Is often called an incline or inclined plane , or, in New Zealand, a jigline , or jig line . One common form of incline is the funicular – an isolated passenger railway where the cars are permanently attached to the cable. In other forms, the cars attach and detach to the cable at the ends of the cable railway. Some cable railways are not steeply graded - these are often used in quarries to move large numbers of wagons between

1890-687: The Australian Agricultural Company coal mine. B Pit opened 1837 and C Pit opened mid-1842. All were private operations by the same company. The majority of inclines were used in industrial settings, predominantly in quarries and mines, or to ship bulk goods over a barrier ridgeline as the Allegheny Portage Railroad and the Ashley Planes feeder railway shipped coal from the Pennsylvania Canal / Susquehanna basin via Mountain Top to

SECTION 20

#1732851557978

1980-636: The Central Railroad of New Jersey 's (CNJ) Mountain Top Yard , which was leased from LH&S from the 1870s in nearby Mountain Top, Pennsylvania . The three railroads were built in 1837, the 1860s, and 1909, and feature a stationary power source using cable winding and winching and cars traveling down as a counterweight to a car being lifted on parallel tracks. It was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1980. The thousand foot lift of

2070-692: The Lehigh Canal in the Delaware River Basin. The Welsh slate industry made extensive use of gravity balance and water balance inclines to connect quarry galleries and underground chambers with the mills where slate was processed. Examples of substantial inclines were found in the quarries feeding the Ffestiniog Railway , the Talyllyn Railway and the Corris Railway amongst others. The Ashley Planes were used to transship heavy cargo over

2160-424: The Lehigh Canal . The Planes were connected by rail to the Pennsylvania Canal sending goods and passengers west and via Mountain Top by rail to White Haven. The Mountain Top to White Haven route also sent Northern Coal Region anthracite down the newly extended Lehigh Canal . The incline railroads were located at Fairview Township and Hanover Township . Before and after loading, coal hoppers would be staged from

2250-555: The Lower Lehigh Canal between 1818 and 1820. The works had made sufficient improvements by late 1820 to deliver 365 tons of anthracite coal to Easton — by 1825 the annual anthracite tonnage had climbed to over 28,000 short tons (25,000 t) per annum. White's ventures firmly established anthracite as a reliable inexpensive fuel and proved that once-treacherous inland Pennsylvania waterways could be engineered into profitable industrial shipping routes. A couple years later,

2340-474: The Pennsylvania Canal System , locally the West Susquehanna Division at Pittston , and the Lehigh Canal and via the Susquehanna River, connect to other transportation infrastructure between Philadelphia and Pittsburgh . The Planes role, specified in the legislation, was to connect the seaports of the Delaware River with the new interior settlements of the near-midwest along the tributary rivers of

2430-641: The Reading Railroad , then headed northwest across the Columbia Bridge over the Schuylkill River . Just after crossing the river, it traveled up the Belmont Plane, an inclined plane in the current location of West Fairmount Park , and continued west across the eastern part of the state to Columbia , where the Columbia Plane headed down to the Susquehanna River . At that point, the eastern division of

2520-529: The Schuylkill Navigation was lagging hope when backers took to quarreling over the best way to proceed. White distanced himself from that project and settled for an alternative route down the Lehigh and Delaware rivers. After surveying and deciding improving navigation on the Lehigh could be feasible, returned to lease the operations of the Lehigh Coal Mine Company and improve navigability on

2610-459: The navigations improving commerce on the Lehigh and Schuylkill Rivers , though in 1824 both systems needed further development. But the same decision makers were also continually reading the copious press coverage about the progress, the works designs, and engineering feats accomplished or building as the Erie Canal progressed. Philadelphia's luminaries were vying with other coastal cities to become

2700-535: The 1850s. As a result of this lack of viable rail transport, political planners, and businessmen regarded canals and water transport via barges over natural water features as the only pragmatic means of shipping bulk goods. The Planes were built in 1837 to 1838 by the Lehigh Coal & Navigation Company (LC&N) in Luzerne County, Pennsylvania . They were built concurrently with rail lines and an extension of

2790-578: The Allegheny River and terminate in Pittsburgh, while residents of the borough of Allegheny favored a north bank canal ending in the borough, across the river from Pittsburgh. Eventually, the canal was run along the physically more favorable north bank, but the state agreed to build the main terminal and turning basin in Pittsburgh and a secondary terminal and connecting canal, the Allegheny Outlet, in

Ashley Planes - Misplaced Pages Continue

2880-705: The Conemaugh River to form the Kiskiminetas River, recognizes the canal's economic contribution to Saltsburg . Download coordinates as: For more on the Philadelphia and Columbia Railroad , see William Hasell Wilson, The Columbia-Philadelphia Railroad and Its Successor (1896). A reprint of this booklet was issued in 1985. See also John C. Trautwine, Jr., The Philadelphia and Columbia Railroad of 1834 , in Philadelphia History , Vol. 2, No. 7 (Philadelphia, PA: City History Soc. of Philadelphia, 1925). This

2970-563: The Delaware Valley, and to transoceanic destinations. This connecting road was an important link that connected Pittsburgh, the Ohio River , and the midwest to the eastern coastal cities via Pennsylvania's canal system and later, other railroads, the shortest path at the time. In the late 1830s, the current mobile steam locomotives were still in the early stages of development and relatively weak and underpowered compared to those available in

3060-468: The Eastern Division on the east side. They solved the problem by building a dam 1,998 feet (609 m) long and 8.5 feet (2.6 m) high between the lower end of Duncan's Island and the east bank of the Susquehanna. This formed a pool across which boats could be pulled from a wooden, two-tier towpath bridge at Clark's Ferry. Two Duncan's Island lift locks raised or lowered the boats traveling between

3150-561: The Kiskiminetas and Conemaugh Rivers to Blairsville and then to the western end of the Allegheny Portage Railroad at Johnstown. East of Tunnelton, the route went through a canal tunnel of 817 feet (249 m) built to avoid a long loop of the Conemaugh River. The first fully loaded freight boat traveled from Johnstown to Pittsburgh in 1831; the route through Grant's Hill opened in 1832. Over its length of 104 miles (167 km),

3240-480: The Lehigh river. The first 60 miles of this planned canal project would follow the Delaware River from Easton to the Philadelphia suburb town of Bristol , and would later become the Delaware Canal . By 1818, White had obtained the legal permissions "to ruin himself" fixing up the Lehigh, founding the Lehigh Navigation Company and using a quasi-lock of his own design to construct what is now known as

3330-467: The Lehigh until the 1960s. While some problems were fixable, the Delaware Canal 's lock's design was always a costly economic problem until the Canal became the parkland and current haven for pleasure boats. White and Hazard made the offer in return for a break on tolls, and even included an offer to operate the system at cost—the state garnering all the tolls. This offer too was declined, and in 1827 in

3420-516: The Lehigh-Susquehanna drainage divide for over a hundred years and became uneconomic only when average locomotive traction engines became heavy and powerful enough that could haul long consists at speed past such obstructions yard to yard faster, even if the more roundabout route added mileage. Level tracks are arranged above and below the gradient to allow wagons to be moved onto the incline either singly or in short rakes of two or more. On

3510-539: The Pennsylvanian interior. White had previously looking for a source of coal in 1815, finding the mines of the failing and unreliable Lehigh Coal Mine Company , which would eventually deliver more coal through the Lehigh Canal than all of the coal they had previously delivered to market since their founding in 1792. White expected to construct a canal system to ship the coal, but efforts to improve shipping capabilities on

3600-474: The South Fork Dam failed, sending 20 million tons (18.2 million cubic meters) of water down the gorge toward Johnstown. More than 2,200 people were killed. The Tunnelview Historical Site shows where in 1830 a canal tunnel of 817 feet (249 m) was built through Bow Ridge to avoid a long bend on the Conemaugh River, 10 miles (16 km) west of Blairsville. Saltsburg Canal Park, where Loyalhanna Creek joins

3690-593: The United States' most important and influential port as the country's population expanded westward to the Ohio Country and Northwest Territory regions. The system would also not only open better access to the newly opened Southeastern Coal Region and the initial mines in the Panther Creek Valley but authorized an extension of the Lehigh Canal up to White Haven, and a railroad connecting that upper canal with

Ashley Planes - Misplaced Pages Continue

3780-418: The ballast method and two as conventional gravity balance. Inclines are classified by the power source used to wind the cable. A stationary engine drives the winding drum that hauls the wagons to the top of the inclined plane and may provide braking for descending loads. Only a single track and cable is required for this type. The stationary engine may be a steam or internal combustion engine, or may be

3870-405: The barney before it emerged from hiding its little tunnel. It also means the barney was moving down hill and away from the latched cars which would then accelerate and bang into the small barneys with considerable force, part of which was transmitted via the cables to everything in the system. It was actually easier to lift cars waiting at a latch for a barney than it was to drop cars down safely onto

3960-575: The belief that locomotive haulage was impracticable. The Rainhill Trials showed that locomotives could handle 1 in 100 gradients . In 1832, the 1 in 17 Bagworth incline opened on Leicester to Burton upon Trent Line ; the incline was bypassed in 1848. On July 20, 1837, the Camden Incline , between Euston and Primrose Hill on the London and Birmingham Railway opened. A Pit fishbelly gravitational railway operated between 1831 and 1846 to service

4050-563: The borough. Getting the main canal across the Allegheny River into Pittsburgh required an aqueduct of 1,140 feet (347 m), the longest on the Pennsylvania Main Line route. Linking to the Ohio River at Pittsburgh, the Western Division Canal also linked, through a tunnel of 810 feet (250 m) under Grant's Hill in Pittsburgh, with the Monongahela River . Subsequent Western Division Canal extensions went from Freeport up

4140-444: The cable railway part way along its length. Various methods were used to achieve this. One arrangement used at the Dinorwic Quarry was known as the "Ballast" method. This involved a two track incline with one track reserved for fully loaded wagons and the second used by partially loaded wagons. The line used by the partially loaded wagons was known as the "ballast" track and it had a stop placed on it part way down. The distance from

4230-492: The cable railway was not continuous. The initial two and later three sections of the Ashley Planes railroad was capable of operation as a funicular railroad or a cable railroad , for its hoist houses all used a pusher cart called a 'barney' hooked into a continuous cable in the same way as a modern ski lift uses a continuous cable. Like a ski lift, the railway was operated from a standing engine by an operator in control of

4320-618: The canal and the Allegheny Portage Railroad. The Pennsylvania Main Line Canal, Juniata Division, Canal Section was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 2002. From 1834 until 1854, when the Pennsylvania Railroad Company finished a competing line, the Allegheny Portage Railroad made continuous boat traffic possible over the Allegheny Mountains between the Juniata and Western Division Canals. It followed

4410-455: The canal continued north along the river and then west. The Northern Liberties and Penn Township Railroad was incorporated in 1829 to build a branch continuing east on Noble Street and Willow Street to the Delaware River . This opened in 1834. The Belmont Plane ran from the Schuylkill River for 2,805 feet (855 m), rising 1 foot (0.3 m) per 15 feet (4.6 m) for a total rise of 187 feet (57 m). Steam-driven cables dragged

4500-635: The canal employed 68 locks, 16 river dams, and 16 aqueducts. From Freeport, a separate extension, the Kittanning Feeder, ran 14 miles (23 km) up the Allegheny River to Kittanning. The 1889 Johnstown Flood was caused by the failure of the South Fork Dam , part of the Main Line of Public Works. The dam across the Little Conemaugh River in the hills above Johnstown, Pennsylvania , created

4590-598: The coal sources in the Wyoming Valley . All the eastern projects were to reliably provide clean-burning anthracite coal to eastern cities that had already consumed much of the eastern forests for heating fuel. The rail portions of the system were authorized in 1828 by an act of the Pennsylvania General Assembly entitled An act relative to the Pennsylvania Canal, and to provide for the commencement of

SECTION 50

#1732851557978

4680-635: The companies expense — the project that would (in concept) become their version of the eventual Delaware Canal (alternatively the 'Delaware Division of the Pennsylvania Canal') built by the states engineering managers a few years later. The route was nearly the same, but the Delaware Canal as the state built it had numerous engineering flaws, including locks both too short and unpaired (single & supporting only one way traffic) locks LC&N's experience and expertise would have mitigated. LC&N had started coal flowing to Philadelphia using short squared-off blocky barges it called coal arks , but in 1822-23

4770-431: The dam pool and the other canals. The Juniata Division Canal was approved in segments starting in 1827 with a canal from near Duncan's Island in the Susquehanna River to Lewistown, 40 miles (64 km) upstream. Subsequently, the state agreed to extend the canal to Hollidaysburg and the eastern end of the Allegheny Portage Railroad, 127 miles (204 km) from the Susquehanna. A total of 86 locks were required to overcome

4860-400: The descending train, or is carried underneath a trwnc car on which the empty train sits. This type of incline is especially associated with the Aberllefenni Slate Quarry that supplied the Corris Railway. This form of incline has the advantages of a gravity balance system with the added ability to haul loads uphill. It is only practical where a large supply of water is available at the top of

4950-408: The drum braking system. At Maenofferen Quarry a system was installed that raised a short section of the rail at the head of the incline to prevent runaways. The operation of an incline was typically controlled by the brakesman positioned at the winding house. A variety of systems were used to communicate with workers at the bottom of the incline, whose job it was to attach and detach the wagons from

5040-420: The earliest years of operation, there was no back track to return cars to the bottom for refilling, and they had to be returned on the Planes, thus slowing and complicating the lift operations. When stopping cars from rolling free, the barneys had to be positioned below the cars, and since the upsides are uphill from the barney house opening, that meant a latch (brake system) had to hold a string of empties above

5130-444: The great plain of southern Pennsylvania (goal of connecting the Susquehanna to New York City via canals) through Harrisburg and across the state to Pittsburgh and connected with other divisions of the Pennsylvania Canal . It consisted of the following principal sections, moving from east to west: The canals reduced travel time between Philadelphia and Pittsburgh from at least 23 days to just four. The Main Line of Public Works

5220-416: The incline cable. One of the most common communication methods was a simple electrical bell system. Cable railways were often used within quarries to connect working levels. Sometimes a single cable railway would span multiple levels, allowing wagons to be moved between the furthest levels in a single movement. In order to accommodate intermediate levels, turnouts were used to allow wagons to leave and join

5310-430: The incline itself the tracks may be interlaced to reduce the width of land needed. This requires use of gauntlet track : either a single track of two rails, or a three-rail track where trains share a common rail; at the centre of the incline there will be a passing track to allow the ascending and descending trains to pass each other. Railway workers attach the cable to the upper wagon, and detach it when it arrives at

5400-422: The incline. An example of this type of cable railway is the passenger carrying Lynton and Lynmouth Cliff Railway . An uncommon form of cable railway uses locomotives, fitted with a winding drum, to power the cable. With the cable or chain attached to the wagons to be drawn, but the drive to the drum disengaged, the locomotive climbs the slope under its own power. When the cable is nearly at its full extent, or when

5490-410: The lack of a tow path canal for the sixty miles Easton-Philadelphia was very costly to LC&N, and the state's Delaware Canal attempt when opened in 1832 was five years later than promised and didn't work; the State had to hire Josiah White to repair its major deficiencies, then needed LC&N's expertise to operate it. LC&N ended up running both canals into the 1930s, and retained the rights to

SECTION 60

#1732851557978

5580-414: The legislature declined another offer by the Lehigh Coal and Navigation Company (LC&N) which had built the Lehigh Canal with private funds. LC&N was unquestionably one of the most innovative companies of the era, driving the mining, transportation and industrial development of Pennsylvania by example, implementation, and by funding quite a few projects, as well. This new proposal was to build— at

5670-652: The line still follows the same route through the castle's fortifications. This line is generally described as the oldest funicular. In the early days of the Industrial Revolution , several railways used cable haulage in preference to locomotives, especially over steep inclines. The Bowes Railway on the outskirts of Gateshead opened in 1826. Today it is the world's only preserved operational 4 ft  8 + 1 ⁄ 2  in ( 1,435 mm ) standard gauge cable railway system. The Cromford and High Peak Railway opened in 1831 with grades up to 1 in 8. There were nine inclined planes: eight were engine-powered, one

5760-400: The lower Susquehanna Valley to Upstate New York as far as Lake Erie . The U.S. was able to claim trans-Appalachian territories from the Ohio River to the lower Great Lakes , and west to Minnesota and Wisconsin . As the Revolutionary War wound down in the 1780s, many family groups moved west, establishing scattered settlements from below the Wyoming Valley across the near west into

5850-406: The mouth of the Juniata River. The canal included 14 locks with an average lift of 7.5 feet (2.3 m). The state originally planned a canal of 24 miles (39 km) running between the Union Canal at Middletown to the Juniata. However, the plan changed in 1828, when the state opted to extend the Eastern Division 19 miles (31 km) further south to connect with the newly decided replacement of

5940-415: The other end of the incline. Generally, special-purpose safety couplings are used rather than the ordinary wagon couplings. The cables may be guided between the rails on the incline by a series of rollers so that they do not fall across the rail where they would be damaged by the wheels on the wagons. Occasionally inclines were used to move locomotives between levels, but these were comparatively rare as it

6030-470: The quarry to the processing plant. The oldest extant cable railway is probably the Reisszug , a private line providing goods access to Hohensalzburg Fortress at Salzburg in Austria. It was first documented in 1515 by Cardinal Matthäus Lang , who became Archbishop of Salzburg . The line originally used wooden rails and a hemp haulage rope and was operated by human or animal power. Today, steel rails, steel cables and an electric motor have taken over, but

6120-452: The railway cars to the top of Belmont Hill. The Plane was the site of a signal event in railroad history. On July 10, 1836, the Philadelphia -based Norris Locomotive Works drove a 4-2-0 locomotive up the Incline, making it the first steam locomotive to climb an ascending grade while pulling a load. The 14,400-pound (6,500 kg) engine, named George Washington , hauled a load of 19,200 pounds (8,709 kg), including 24 people riding on

6210-404: The retreating western frontiers and the lands of the old Ohio Country . In the early 1800s, the new farms established along the moving frontier west of the Appalachian mountains were being connected back to Atlantic seaboard cities by turnpikes, canals, and other transportation infrastructure works funded mostly by private funds or local governments. By the 1810s the population west of the mountains

6300-466: The route of present-day Montgomery Avenue in Lower Merion Township, was abandoned. The Columbia Bridge and line east to Broad and Vine Streets were sold to the Philadelphia and Reading Railroad as part of its main line. The Reading acquired the Northern Liberties and Penn Township Railroad in 1870, giving it access to the Delaware River. The section of the old Pennsylvania Railroad running from Philadelphia west through Chester County and, by extension,

6390-425: The section from 52nd Street west to the main line at Rosemont . The state built the rest from 52nd Street east to downtown, but on a different alignment than the one originally planned; the new line, put into operation October 15, 1850, ended at the west end of the Market Street Bridge , from which the City Railroad continued east. The old line, which ran from the Schuylkill River up the Belmont Plane to Ardmore along

6480-451: The standard width railroad tracks so the barney could slide away and let gravity take the consist onto the marshaling yard . When using funicular action, as it did sending returns down during its early years the rails split connecting two pairs of tracks bulging out in a vase-like shape in a passing area, so the railway could ship freight downhill east to west as well as the heavy operations west to east which predominated until its closing. In

6570-504: The state built three reservoirs on Juniata tributaries to keep the upper parts of the canal filled with water. A canal section of 1.5 miles (2.4 km) has been restored near Locust Campground, 3 miles (4.8 km) west of Lewistown. At the western end of the canal, the Hollidaysburg Canal Basin Park has preserved two canal basins and a connecting lock; a museum at the park illustrates how canal boats transferred between

6660-454: The state needed to hire Josiah White to fix it before it became fully usable in 1834. Lehigh Coal & Navigation Company would operate the Canal into the 1930s, and controlled its resources and those rights attained on the Lehigh until the 1960s when they reverted or conveyed back to the state. Hence the Canal system was envisioned and built at the urging of New Jersey and Pennsylvanian businessmen, especially Philadelphia's bearing witness to

6750-478: The summit is reached, the locomotive is fastened to the rails and the cable wound in. In a simpler form the cable is attached to a locomotive, usually at the upper end of the incline. The locomotive is driven away from the head of the incline, hauling wagons up the inclined plane. The locomotive itself does not travel on the steeply graded section. An example is at the Amberley Chalk Pits Museum . This

6840-502: The tender and one freight car, up the grade at 15 miles (24 km) per hour. So remarkable was this accomplishment that reports in engineering journals doubted its occurrence. Nine days later, the engine repeated the feat in a more formal trial with an even greater load. In 1850, the state bought the West Philadelphia Railroad, which had been incorporated in 1835 to bypass the Belmont Plane and failed after completing only

6930-442: The top of the incline to the stop was the same as the distance that the fully loaded wagons needed to travel. Empty wagons were hauled up the incline, counterbalanced by the descending ballast wagons. These empty wagons were replaced by fully loaded wagons ready to descend. The descending loaded wagons then returned the ballast wagons to the top of the incline. One of the major inclines at Dinorwic had four parallel tracks, two worked by

7020-541: The transportation of anthracite coal. The railroads were in use until 1948. Main Line of Public Works The Main Line of Public Works was a package of legislation passed by the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania in 1826 to establish a means of transporting freight between Philadelphia and Pittsburgh . It funded the construction of various long-proposed canal and road projects, mostly in southern Pennsylvania, that became

7110-564: The vast Mississippi River drainage basin. It was designed during the mid-canal era as part of an overall strategic schema to lift heavy freight eastwards out of the Susquehanna Valley in suburban Wilkes-Barre into the eastside descents , which gravity aided to the canal head and thence using cheap practical water transport ended feeding much needed coal into all the big coastal cities of the Eastern United States accessible via

7200-516: The western basin at Johnstown. At its summit, the railroad reached an elevation of 2,322 feet (708 m) above sea level . In 1826, the state legislature authorized the first segment of the Western Division Canal, from Pittsburgh up the Allegheny River to its confluence with the Kiskiminetas River at Freeport . Pittsburgh residents favored a route that would follow the south bank of

7290-412: The western suburbs of Philadelphia, is still known as the Main Line . The Columbia Plane, which lowered railway cars down to the Eastern Division Canal along the Susquehanna River , was bypassed in 1840 by a new track alignment. The Pennsylvania Canal's Eastern Division, which opened in 1833, ran 43 miles (69 km) along the east side of the Susquehanna River between Columbia and Duncan's Island at

7380-430: Was already re-doing the upper four locks on the Lehigh Canal to support a steam powered tug pulling boats over 120 feet (37 m) built to support two way traffic with full locks. By 1825 the volume of coal coming down the Lehigh & Delaware to Philadelphia was becoming huge and problematic — LC&N was rapidly over logging the forests feeding the Lehigh to build boats for the one way trip. The extra expenses of

7470-485: Was barely connected to eastern markets except by pack mule, or only through long and arduous routes down the Susquehanna River then over land to Philadelphia . The Ashley Planes job was to join two railroad sections at either elevation and bridge over the drainage divide between the Susquehanna Valley and that of the Lehigh and Delaware Valleys . It was purpose-built to join the freight capacity of two canals,

7560-566: Was cable-hauled from its opening in 1896 until it was converted to electric power in 1935. A few examples exist of cables being used on conventional railways to assist locomotives on steep grades. The Cowlairs incline was an example of this, with a continuous rope used on this section from 1842 until 1908. The middle section of the Erkrath-Hochdahl Railway in Germany (1841–1926) had an inclined plane where trains were assisted by rope from

7650-525: Was completed in 1834 and was sold to the Pennsylvania Railroad on June 25, 1857, for $ 7,500,000. Within a year, the PRR replaced the Philadelphia-Pittsburgh route with an entirely rail-based system. The Philadelphia and Columbia Railroad began in Philadelphia at Broad and Vine Streets, ran north on Broad and west on Pennsylvania Avenue, a segment later taken over and submerged and tunneled over by

7740-530: Was exploding. Regional transport hubs were established in Brownsville , Pittsburgh , Cincinnati , Buffalo , Detroit , and New Orleans (and later in the 1840s St. Louis , Chicago , and St. Joseph , Missouri would develop similarly). The markets of this burgeoning population were targeted by the business class of Philadelphia and New Jersey. The War of 1812 exacerbated a difficult energy crisis, and bituminous coal imports from Liverpool, England, ground to

7830-425: Was normally cheaper to provide a separate fleet of locomotives on either side of the incline, or else to work the level sections with horses. On early railways, cable-worked inclines were also used on some passenger lines. The speed of the wagons was usually controlled by means of a brake that acted on the winding drum at the head of the incline. The incline cable passed round the drum several times to ensure there

7920-806: Was one of many British policies that created support for the American Revolution along the American frontier for those hoping to emigrate into the Ohio Country , and also for East Coast seaboard populations that were blooming in the pre-industrialization period. After the 1779 Sullivan Expedition broke the power of the Five Civilized Nations of the Iroquois towards the end of the American Revolutionary War , settlement became viable from

8010-434: Was operated by a horse gin . The Middleton Top winding engine house at the summit of Middleton Incline has been preserved and the ancient steam engine inside, once used to haul wagons up, is often demonstrated. The Liverpool and Manchester Railway opened in 1830 with cable haulage down a 1 in 48 grade to the dockside at Liverpool . It was originally designed for cable haulage up and down 1 in 100 grades at Rainhill in

8100-419: Was sufficient friction for the brake to slow the rotation of the drum – and therefore the wagons – without the cable slipping. At the head of the incline various devices were employed to ensure that wagons did not start to descend before they were attached to the cable. These ranged from simple lumps of rock wedged behind the wagon's wheels to permanently installed chocks that were mechanically synchronized with

#977022