PRR Screenshots

I love how you did the yard ladder on that curve. Very impressive!

That took some time and patience, I have a lot of work on mine to get it looking that good.

No kidding! I thought building a straight yard ladder was hard enough!

Another advantage of using FT Track as a curve guide (laying single track right over top of the FT Track).

I've been working on the old 2 tracked mainline of the Portage Railroad from Petersburg-Hollidaysburg-Tunnelhill via the Muleshoe curve.

The line to Tyrone-Altoona-Bennington at one time did not open until 1854, and the Muleshoe was the steeper grade across the Appalachian Front Range, opened in 1855 closed in 1857, reopened in 1904, and was still used up until the mid 1980's for low grade, coal/ore genney drags.

Yup, Conrail abandoned it for several reasons one of course being route mile reductions the other that the state wanted to build the new RT 22 on part of the ROW. Sadly now when following the Frankstown branch of the Juniata you can barely tell that there wasa busy two track branch that followed the river to Petersburg.

It was not a branchline, it was the original Portage Railroad Mainline. You can still walk the roadbed, but I suppose that alot of brush, not to mention Copperheads and Timber Rattlers. Only an @ 2 mile section, across the valley from the Tunnelhill-Bennington was used as US22 road construction.

I walked the WopsyRR trackbed, maintained by the Juniata Sportsmans Assc, horse and ATV traffic trampling the brush. It was a long 7 mile walk (even downhill the +3% grade) rough slate, and indiginious rock roadbed, with rough hewn tree ties still evident since it was constructed in 1897, and abandond in 1920.

The WopsyRR advertised needing 100 workers for 2 weeks, @ $1 a 16 hour day, to fill in the Sandy Gap trestle with earth and rocks (it is still there under all that fill), hard manual labor with only picks, shovels, and mules.
http://www.billspennsyphotos.com/apps/photos/photo?photoid=172876993

Before the PRR built to it it was part of the portage railroad and canal. It wasn't until they got to Altoona that they connected to it via the Hollidaysburg line. The biggest problem it was that the portage railroad would charge PRR pretty high fees for using the line and they would shut it down in the winter when the canal froze. The actual line didn't become part of the PRR until they already had built thier own main via the horseshoe curve and the canal started to loose thier business and became a maintenance headache, 1 August 1857 being the date they assumed ownership. In thier first year of operation over thier own line PRR carried 250,000 tons of freight and that sealed the fate of the canal. PRR actually shut down the Portage Railroad and didn't reopen it until 1903 then they upgraded the whole line to Petersburg and used it and the Holidaysburg yard as a easbound coal bypass of Altoona. Then of course in 1952 they started construction on the legendary Samual Rea car shops. The history of the Main Line of Public Works and the Broad Way is quite interesting and sometimes has some strange twists.

I learned something new today !

I have no proof of chain of events (it was before my time) ... but from what I've read, that the canal was following the Frankstown Branch of the Little Juniata River terminating in Hollidaysburg, connecting to the hemp rope pulley Alleghenny Portage Inclined Plane Railroad to Johnstown.

Continuing westward from Petersburg, the New Portage Railroad began cutting it's own Muleshoe line railroad bed about the same as the PRR was cutting the Horseshoe line, (and the New Portage Railroad was a competitor of the PRR which began cutting its own line in 1847).

The Horseshoe was opened in 1854, @ 1 year earlier than the Muleshoe.

The heyday of the PA canal period was @ 1790-1835 ... New Portage Railroad opened the Petersburg-Hollidaysburg-Tunnelhill - Muleshoe mainline in 1855, but was abandoned in 1857, and reopened by the PRR in 1904 as a low grade ore drag line.

Only when the Horseshoe was completed in 1854, did real heavy duty railroad operations go full steam ahead in Spruce Creek-Tyrone-Altoona (@ 1847 construction began).

The Muleshoe Curve was built by the PA State, to bypass the Inclined Planes (opened in 1855).
http://www.abandonedrails.com/New_Portage_Railroad

The plaque at the Horsehoe Curve states that the line south, the Cove Secondary - Alto to Wye (Hollidaysburg) was the original 1850-1854 PRR Mainline ... How can that be, if the Muleshoe line wasn't opened until 1855 ? If the freight and passenger trains were going south to Hollidaysburg in 1850, and the Muleshoe wasn't opened for another 5 years, the PRR mainline must have teminated there, and passengers and freight were transfered onto canal boats and barges being hauled up the Inclined Planes.

Pretty much, it's funny because the state chartered the PRR to build a line to Pittsburg then when the PRR started to compete with the state owned Canal they got kind of angry and at first didn't want the PRR to finish the horse shoe curve route because they wanted to keep the New Portage Railroad as part of the link. Good info on the history of the Railroad is the Triumph series, although it's getting a bit hard to buy directly from the publisher anymore. They no longer accept credit cards only check and money order, so unless I can manage to get up there to either the museum by 17th street or the curve in the open season or feel like finding my check book I'm kind of SOL. And the books are a bit pricey at $75.00 a pop. I have Triumph 3 and 4 but I would like the entire series, I think it's 8 books.

Late PRR

Drchoi21, where are those brilliant canopies from?

from Sherman hill route - pensilina Sherman Cheyenne <kuid:146087:60118>

I have a few more. Many Thanks to Ben for the Connecting Railway bridge across the Schuylkill.
http://s1278.beta.photobucket.com/u...oligicalDrive_zps0ad88f07.jpg.html?sort=3&o=0
http://s1278.beta.photobucket.com/u...erThankstoBen_zpscc6f5137.jpg.html?sort=3&o=1
http://s1278.beta.photobucket.com/u...estfromBridge_zpsec5d7abf.jpg.html?sort=3&o=2

Lets Go Train Tipping ...

HEY!!! What's the story on that N5C??!!?? I know its not the MagicLand one (it is solid with no "real" windows) and the only other one I know of is the RooRocz one that never came to be.

Pretty sure that was made for MSTS 2 before the game was cancelled. There is a web page from the creator somewhere with other shots of it.

opus722 said:

Pretty sure that was made for MSTS 2 before the game was cancelled. There is a web page from the creator somewhere with other shots of it.

Click to expand...

WOW! Found it here. He's got some really nice vaporware there. Too bad the RooRocz ones went vaporware too. Those were some really nice N5-C's also.

This yard holds 5400 + railcars ... I think I'll fill it up with PRR Hopper Rail splines