New Castle Branch (Pennsylvania Railroad)

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
For the line in Delaware, see .

The New Castle Branch was a rail line owned and operated by the Pennsylvania Railroad in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania. The line ran from New Castle north to Stoneboro (later Mercer), and is now entirely abandoned. At its south end, the line intersected the and . When the New Castle Branch ended at Stoneboro, the PRR had trackage rights east along the New York Central Railroad's to Oil City and the , , and .[1]

The New Castle Branch (and the , a short spur of it) was the only part of the Western New York and Pennsylvania Railway operated by the Pennsylvania Company as part of the rather than by the Pennsylvania Railroad as part of the . The Pennsylvania Company also operated the trackage rights from Stoneboro to Oil City.[2]

History[]

The opened the line from New Castle to in 1873[3] and to Stoneboro in 1874.[4] The NC&F was sold at foreclosure and reorganized in 1881 as the , which was merged into the and then the in 1882. The BNY&P was reorganized as the Western New York and Pennsylvania Railroad in 1887, and again as the Western New York and Pennsylvania Railway in 1895.[5] The Pennsylvania Railroad leased the WNY&P in 1900, including the New Castle Branch,[6] which was immediately subleased to the Pennsylvania Company.[2]

The lease (and other Pennsylvania Company leases) was returned to the PRR in 1918.[7] Passenger service was last operated over the branch on June 9, 1931,[8] and the line north of (near Mercer) was abandoned in 1938.[9]

References[]

  1. ^ Pennsylvania Railroad, 1920s Division Accounting Maps
  2. ^ a b "PRR Corporate History: Pennsylvania Company". Archived from the original on 2002-01-11. Retrieved 2006-12-08.
  3. ^ "PRR Chronology, 1873" (PDF). (100 KiB), February 2005 Edition
  4. ^ "PRR Chronology, 1874" (PDF). (95.9 KiB), March 2005 Edition
  5. ^ PRR Corporate History: Western New York and Pennsylvania Archived 2001-06-01 at archive.today
  6. ^ "PRR Chronology, 1900" (PDF). (59.2 KiB), March 2005 Edition
  7. ^ "PRR Chronology, 1918" (PDF). (117 KiB), June 2004 Edition
  8. ^ "PRR Chronology, 1931" (PDF). (68.9 KiB), August 2004 Edition
  9. ^ "PRR Chronology, 1938" (PDF). (39.1 KiB), August 2004 Edition
Retrieved from ""