[PRCo] South Fork - Portage Railway

[Daria Phoebe Brashear]

On Sat, Nov 25, 2017 at 9:26 AM, Stephen Titchenal <stephen at titchenal.com>
wrote:

> The left side of the val map includes the right side of tracing #3 with
> the location of the PC Ry. track showing.  Tracing 4  actually corresponds
> with most of the val map section. Tracing 5 shows the right side of the val
> map.
>
>
>
> The valuation maps were intended to show railroad property only. Sometimes
> nearby roads and railroads (in this case the PC Ry) were also shown. If you
> are lucky, the surveyor/draftsman showed more than a minimum of
> non-railroad culture.  Often the non-railroad culture was not updated in a
> revised val maps -- only railroad owned track, buildings and property.
>
>
>
> Looking at the portion of Maple Street available in Google Street view I
> agree it looks like the hill in the photo. Might be able to identify one of
> the homes if visiting the area.  The caption indicates that the bumping
> post was near the car (auto or trolley?). That is not the end of the line,
> so why would the bumping post be there?
>
>
>
> Attached is a colored DEM of the area with my tracing of the Penn Central
> Ry right of way in yellow and an elevation profile below it. The PRR tracks
> in in Red, the original Portage RR is in light blue. The Southern Cambria
> Ry is in purple.  When I have some time (maybe in a couple of weeks) I’ll
> use the Lidar to create a more accurate elevation profile rather than
> whatever Google Earth is using. I’ll also georeference the 1938 aerial.
>
>
>
> Where is the reference to the stationing referred to? 72+85 and 79+15?
>
>
>
>
> So we know the stations are 700 feet apart, one is in Croyle and one is in
Summerhill. That gives us a bracket of ~1400 feet on either end of
Summerhill, basically.
Measuring 7285ish feet from the South Fork/Croyle boundary doesn't yield a
700 foot window across either boundary. Measuring from a point
approximately where the line rejoined the road at the east end of the
diversion into the hollow where the route 219 interchange is yields a
crossing in Summerhill and another in Croyle, on either side of the first
underpass east of Summerhill. Maybe, but 1) the val map showing that
underpass will probably tell us and 2) I don't see why.

Okay, so what if we measure from Main and Railroad Sts? Then we get a point
in Croyle, east of the cemetery, and a point in Summerhill, after the line
crosses the river. It would mean the line would cross the river on the
north side of the street, between the street and the railroad. I don't know
*why* this would be desirable, but the aerial shows something which might
fit this conclusion. I'll mark up a copy and attach it.

Also, the answer to why the first two underpasses east of Summerhill were
fine and the subway in question was not? The first 2 are multi-arch spans
of ample width and the 3rd is an underpass which spanned only the portage
railroad, thus narrower. Hence presumably why the state was more
proprietary about it, tho it's unclear what the PRR granting use of right
of way to the trolley company bought them if then they couldn't use this.

-- 
Daria Phoebe Brashear
AuriStor, Inc
dariaphoebe.com



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