[PRCo] April 18, 1931 - Proposal to Save Butler Line

[Bob Rathke]

I'm not sure if  it  was called,  "commuter service", but in the T eens and T wenties - and well into the 40's - the B&O had regional passenger service f rom Pittsburgh to Butler and New Castle via Zelien ople . In the 20's t he branch to But ler diverted from the B&O mainline south of Evans City near Callery, and by the 40' s the line to Butler diverted from the mainline at Eidenau which is just northwest  of Evans City. Between Pittsburgh and Callery/Eidenau the B&O served passengers at places like Etna, Allison Park, Glenshaw, Gibsonia, Mars and Vanencia.    



Until the early 30's, the B&O's Washington D.C. to Chicago mainline passenger t rains ran between Pittsburgh and New Castle via the Evans City line.  After that time, the B&O's Washington-Chicago passenger trains had trackage rights over the P&LE between McKeesport and New Cas tle.    And, for a time in the late 1980's and early 90's  some Pittsburgh-Chicago Amtrak trains used the line through Evan City. 



Bob  


----- Original Message -----


From: "Schneider, Fred" <fwschneider at comcast.net> 
To: "Western PA Trolley discussion" <pittsburgh-railways at mailman.dementix.org> 
Sent: Monday, April 29, 2013 8:01:18 PM 
Subject: Re: [PRCo] April 18, 1931 - Proposal to Save Butler Line 


No way I can trump "not in Harmony" with "travel to Mars."   Yins are being very punny. 

Me thinks there were too many old timers who wanted to stay back in 1915 but didn't understand that by 1931 almost all the rural families had a motor car (or as it was called in eastern Pennsylvania, a machine).   Of those 70,000 people, I'll bet if you looked at the passenger revenues collected versus the one-way fare from Pittsburgh to Butler and the total passengers carried, you might find the same thing I did analyzing the Lancaster system and that is that most passengers were only riding a couple of miles.   In the case of the Harmony route, I'd almost be willing to bet that the cars were empty on most trips through the middle of the route and that most passengers rode only for a mile or two into Butler, or the last couple miles from Allison Park or Glenshaw into Etna. 

I have no clue what kind of railroad commuter service the B&O had then … that's Bob Rathke's area … but I suspect even in the teens the people who wanted to go from Butler to Pittsburgh used the mainline trains because they were faster. 


On Apr 29, 2013, at 6:20 PM, Dwight Long wrote: 

> 
> Ed 
> 
> Yes, it is quite true.  Their (PRC) views were not in Harmony with folks 
> trying to save the interurbans. 
> 
> Dwight 
> 
> ----- Original Message ----- 
> From: "Edward H. Lybarger" <trams2 at comcast.net> 
> To: "'Western PA Trolley discussion'" 
> <pittsburgh-railways at mailman.dementix.org> 
> Sent: Monday, April 29, 2013 3:42 PM 
> Subject: Re: [PRCo] April 18, 1931 - Proposal to Save Butler Line 
> 
> 
>> PRCo didn't have any money, either.  I don't think they were interested in 
>> travel to Mars. 
>> 
>> Ed 
>> 
>> -----Original Message----- 
>> From: pittsburgh-railways-bounces at mailman.dementix.org 
>> [mailto:pittsburgh-railways-bounces at mailman.dementix.org] On Behalf Of 
>> Barry, Matthew R 
>> Sent: Monday, April 29, 2013 2:21 PM 
>> To: Western PA Trolley discussion 
>> (pittsburgh-railways at mailman.dementix.org) 
>> Subject: [PRCo] April 18, 1931 - Proposal to Save Butler Line 
>> 
>> Pittsburgh Railways is asked to take over the line. 
>> 
>> Matt 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> -------------- next part -------------- 
>> An HTML attachment was scrubbed... 
>> URL: 
>> http://mailman.dementix.org/pipermail/pittsburgh-railways/attachments/201304 
>> 29/404e224c/attachment.html 
>> -------------- next part -------------- 
>> A non-text attachment was scrubbed... 
>> Name: ButlerLine_APRIL_18_1931.jpg 
>> Type: image/jpeg 
>> Size: 606027 bytes 
>> Desc: ButlerLine_APRIL_18_1931.jpg 
>> Url : 
>> http://mailman.dementix.org/pipermail/pittsburgh-railways/attachments/201304 
>> 29/404e224c/attachment.jpg 
>> _______________________________________________ 
>> Pittsburgh-railways mailing list 
>> Pittsburgh-railways at mailman.dementix.org 
>> https://mailman.dementix.org/mailman/listinfo/pittsburgh-railways 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> _______________________________________________ 
>> Pittsburgh-railways mailing list 
>> Pittsburgh-railways at mailman.dementix.org 
>> https://mailman.dementix.org/mailman/listinfo/pittsburgh-railways 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> _______________________________________________ 
> Pittsburgh-railways mailing list 
> Pittsburgh-railways at mailman.dementix.org 
> https://mailman.dementix.org/mailman/listinfo/pittsburgh-railways 





_______________________________________________ 
Pittsburgh-railways mailing list 
Pittsburgh-railways at mailman.dementix.org 
https://mailman.dementix.org/mailman/listinfo/pittsburgh-railways 



-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://mailman.dementix.org/pipermail/pittsburgh-railways/attachments/20130430/bb2c2727/attachment.html