[PRCo] one more South Fork-Portage/Penn Central source

[Barry, Matthew R]

Never knew this.  Thanks for sharing.

------ Original message------
From: Daria Phoebe Brashear via Pittsburgh-railways
Date: Sat, Jan 18, 2020 1:23 PM
To: Western PA Trolley discussion;
Cc:
Subject:[PRCo] one more South Fork-Portage/Penn Central source

Railroad Magazine, May 1948, the forgotten trolleys of Cambria County.

"The Southern Cambria electric never contemplated going beyond South Fork
with its track east from Johnstown. Yet there was another road that planned
on building east from South Fork, through Portage and Gallitzin into
Altoona, Pa. This was the South Fork-Portage Railway which started
construction east from South Fork along a single track in 1913. Two heavy
steel, center door interurbans were ordered from the Niles Car Company for
the start of what was hoped to be an extensive interurban, with trackage
rights over the SCR into Johnstown.

Actually what resulted was more of a joke than an interurban line to the
riders, once it commenced operation. Instead of going to Altoona or
Gallitzin, or even Portage, the line traveled a couple miles out of South
Fork to Summerhill, and a mile or so beyond, stopping just a few feet east
of the old Portage Railroad cut. It was graded to Portage, and a bridge was
built at Wilmore, but there the money ran out. So a three-mile single track
was the net result of the originally impressive plan.

The two heavy interurbans arrived as ordered from Niles Company. Painted
red, they closely resembled similar equipment used on Kansas City, Clay
County and St. Joe, and on the Trenton-Princeton interurban in New Jersey.
But on a single-tracked shortline with no turnouts, it's not only difficult
to operate two cars -- it's impossible. For there's no way to get one car
past the other without installing helicopter blades.

So we find Number 1 standing at the east end of the track where it stayed
until abandonment, having never been operated. Car 2 made the short run
back and forth, day after day, on hourly schedule, The ponderous
interurban, with its whistle, arc headlight and impressive pilot was little
short of ridiculous on this three-mile _interurban_ pike. Due to the center
doors, a two-man crew was necessary; so with expected haste, the road went
into receivership, and was reorganized as the Penn Central Railway in 1918.

Like the Southern Cambria Railway, the Penn Central had its troubles with
the hilly country, Coming into South Fork, the right-of-way passed down a
heavy grade, and on several occasions cars glided down the slope into town
like toboggans, knocking down power poles and throwing South Fork into
darkness. On one occasion Number 2 ran off the tracks, clipped off the
front of a store and a barber shop, then swung back into the street and
rolled to a stop beside the Pennsy tracks. A Pennsylvania derrick lifted
the car on to the railroad's track and carted it up to the old Portage cut
where it set it back on its own runway again.

Finally, the town put a large bumping block across the rails at the borough
line, stopping the car there. This spelled doom for the Penn Central. In a
matter of weeks, the line had ceased operation."





--
Daria Phoebe Brashear
AuriStor, Inc
dariaphoebe.com
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