Pennsylvania - Allegheny Portage Railroad National Historic Site

The history at this site was so interesting to me, and probably not JUST because I am a transportation engineer. The site is in rural Pennsylvania, in the Allegheny mountains.

What happened at this location was that in the early 1800’s, to assist with western migration and the movement of goods to the east from the west, there needed to be an easier way to get across the Allegheny Mountains. The solution was a Portage Railroad.

They basically created a railroad that would carry canal barges on rail cars and would use a series of ropes and coal power to get the rail cars over the mountains. On the other side, the canal barges were put back in the water.

During the 20 some years that this was in service, there were some horrible accidents because the 3.5-inch braided rope gave out sending the rail cars tumbling. As a result, engineer Roebling invented a braided wire rope which helped with the safety of the portage. After 20 years, steam powered trains had become more powerful, and a new, gradually sloped rail was placed to make the portage unnecessary.

The Historic Site includes a museum and gift shop. The site also has a movie which does a great job of explaining the mechanisms that were designed for the portage.

To read more about this cool piece of history, check out the NPS Website for the Allegheny Portage RR NHS