The Lehigh Line is a railroad line in Central New Jersey, Northeastern Pennsylvania, and the Lehigh Valley region of eastern Pennsylvania. It is owned and operated by the Norfolk Southern Railway. The line runs west from the vicinity of the Port of New York and New Jersey in Manville, New Jersey via Conrail's Lehigh Line to the southern end of Wyoming Valley's Coal Region in Lehigh Township, Pennsylvania.
The railroad is part of both Norfolk Southern's Keystone Division and the Crescent Corridor. the line is freight-only, although there are perennial proposals to restore passenger service over all or part of the line.
The Lehigh Line hosts approximately twenty-five trains per day. The line runs from Port Reading Junction in Manville, New Jersey to Penn Haven Junction in Lehigh Township, Pennsylvania. At Port Reading Junction, it meets the Trenton Subdivision. It crosses the Delaware River at Phillipsburg, New Jersey. Most of the traffic along the line consists of intermodal and general merchandise trains going to yards.
History 19th century
The majority of the line was once the main line of the Lehigh Valley Railroad. The first segment, which runs between Easton and Allentown, opened in September 1855. Later extensions and corporate acquisitions carried the Lehigh Valley main line to Buffalo, New York to the west and Perth Amboy, New Jersey to the east. Some portions of the line were constructed by the Lehigh and Susquehanna Railroad (L&S). Conceived as a competitor to the Lehigh Valley, the L&S constructed a parallel line on the north side of the Lehigh River. The line opened in 1868 and was soon leased by the Central Railroad of New Jersey (CNJ).
Passenger service ended on the Lehigh Valley in 1961. The Lehigh Valley assumed the lease of the L&S from the CNJ in 1972 when the latter abandoned operations in Pennsylvania. Both the Lehigh Valley and CNJ were merged into Conrail in 1976. Conrail retained the ex-Lehigh Valley main line and named it the Lehigh Line. Conrail combined the Bethlehem–Allentown portion of the Lehigh Valley main line with the ex-Reading Company Reading Line; the Lehigh Line now uses the former L&S route between those two cities. In the 1980s Conrail abandoned the ex-Lehigh Valley bridge over the Delaware River at Phillipsburg, New Jersey in favor of the L&S/CNJ bridge.
With the line integrating former Lehigh and Susquehanna Railroad-owned CNJ Pennsylvania leased main line trackage into both its original route and into its route between Allentown and Lehighton, Conrail integrated other CNJ trackage, owned by CNJ itself, around Phillipsburg into the line so the line's Lehigh Valley trackage in Phillipsburg and the line's new CNJ trackage in Phillipsburg are part of the line. This lasted until the mid to late 1980s when Conrail decided to close and abandon the line's Lehigh Valley Phillipsburg trackage, which includes the Lehigh Valley Phillipsburg bridge, due to the Lehigh Valley Phillipsburg bridge needing repairs, in favor of using the CNJ Phillipsburg trackage full-time including the CNJ Phillipsburg bridge, which is more stable than the Lehigh Valley Phillipsburg bridge.
The Norfolk Southern acquired the Lehigh Line in 1999 in the Conrail split with CSX Transportation. The New Jersey section from Manville to Newark was spun off into Conrail Shared Assets Operations Lehigh Line, allowing for equal competition between Norfolk Southern and CSX.
Lehigh Valley Railroad
The Lehigh Valley Railroad incorporated on April 21, 1846. Funding problems delayed the company's growth, and it was not until late 1852 that the company, under newly appointed chief engineer Robert H. Sayre, surveyed the route between Mauch Chunk and Easton. The company changed its name to the Lehigh Valley Railroad on January 7, 1853. The line opened between Easton and Allentown on June 11, 1855, and west to Mauch Chunk on September 12.
At Easton, the Lehigh Valley constructed an unusual double-decker bridge across the Delaware River to Phillipsburg. The upper level proceeded to connect with the Central Railroad of New Jersey and Morris Canal while the lower level curved south to meet the Belvidere Delaware Railroad. This bridge enabled the Lehigh Valley to interchange coal for both the New York City and Philadelphia markets, respectively. The upper level opened on September 7; the lower level in late December.
The length of the line from Jim Thorpe to Easton, which included the line's original route from Easton to Allentown was 46 miles of single track. The line was laid with a rail weighing 56 pounds per yard supported upon cross ties 6 x 7 inches and 7-1/2 feet long placed two feet apart with about a quarter of it ballasted with stone or gravel. The line had a descending or level grade from Jim Thorpe to Easton and, with the exception of the curve at Jim Thorpe, had no curve less than a 700 feet radius.
Expansion to New York state
In the 1860s, LV expanded the line northward to the Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania area and up the Susquehanna River to the New York state line.
In 1864, the LV began acquiring feeder railroads and merging them into its system. The first acquisitions were the Beaver Meadow Railroad and Coal Company, which included a few hundred acres of coal land, and the Penn Haven and White Haven Railroad. The purchase of the Penn Haven and White Haven was the first step in expanding to Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania. To reach Wilkes-Barre, the LV began constructing an extension from White Haven, Pennsylvania to Wilkes-Barre. The Penn Haven and White Haven Railroad allowed the LV to reach White Haven.
In 1866, the LV acquired the Lehigh and Mahanoy Railroad, originally the Quakake Railroad, and the North Branch Canal along the Susquehanna River, renaming it the Pennsylvania and New York Canal & Railroad Company (P&NY). The purchasing of the North Branch Canal saw an opportunity for a near-monopoly in the region north of the Wyoming Valley. In 1866, two years after the purchase of the Penn Haven and White Haven, the extension from White Haven to Wilkes-Barre opened.
Construction of a rail line to the New York state line started immediately, and in 1867 the line was complete from Wilkes-Barre to Waverly, New York, where coal was transferred to the broad-gauge Erie Railroad and shipped to western markets through Buffalo, New York. To reach Wilkes-Barre, the LV purchased the Penn Haven and White Haven Railroad in 1864, and began constructing an extension from White Haven to Wilkes-Barre that was opened in 1867. By 1869, the LVRR owned a continuous track through Pennsylvania from Easton to Waverly.
In the following year, the Lehigh Valley, a standard gauge railroad, completed arrangements with the Erie Railroad, at that time having a six-foot gauge, for a third rail within its tracks to enable LV equipment to run through to Elmira and later to Buffalo.
In the 1870s, the LV was extended further, following its acquisition of other large tracts of land starting at in 1870, with an additional of in 1872, as it sought to expand into New Jersey and New York City. In 1870, the Lehigh Valley Railroad acquired trackage rights to Auburn, New York on the Southern Central Railroad.
In 1872, the Lehigh Valley Railroad purchased the dormant charter of the Perth Amboy and Bound Brook Railroad which had access to the Perth Amboy, New Jersey harbor, and added to it a new charter, the Bound Brook and Easton Railroad. The state of New Jersey passed legislation that allowed the LV to consolidate its New Jersey railroads into one company; the Perth Amboy and Bound Brook and the Bound Brook and Easton were merged to form a new railroad company called the Easton and Amboy Railroad (or Easton & Amboy Railroad Company).The Musconetcong Tunnel, A Treatise on Explosive Compounds, Machine Rock Drills and Blasting, Henry Sturgis Drinker, J. Wiley & sons, 1883, p. 303 Internet Archive
The Easton and Amboy Railroad was a railroad built across central New Jersey by the Lehigh Valley Railroad from Phillipsburg, New Jersey to Bound Brook, New Jersey to connect the Lehigh Valley Railroad coal hauling operations in Pennsylvania with the Port of New York and New Jersey to serve consumer markets in the New York metropolitan area, eliminating the Phillipsburg connection with the CNJ that had previously been the only LV access to the New York tidewater. Until it was built, the terminus of the LV had been at Phillipsburg, New Jersey, on the Delaware River opposite Easton, Pennsylvania. The Easton and Amboy was used as a connection to the New York metropolitan area, with a terminus in Jersey City, New Jersey.
Construction commenced in 1872 as soon the Easton and Amboy was formed; coal docks at Perth Amboy were soon constructed, and most of the line's new expanded New Jersey route from Easton to Perth Amboy was graded and rails laid. However, the route required building a wooden bridge over the Delaware River to connect Easton with Phillipsburg, New Jersey, and building a tunnel through/under Musconetcong Mountain near Pattenburg, New Jersey, about twelve miles east of Phillipsburg, and that proved troublesome.
The tunnel delayed the opening of the Easton and Amboy part of the line until May 1875, when a coal train first passed over the line. To support the anticipated increase in train traffic, the wooden bridge over the Delaware River in Easton was replaced by a double-tracked, iron bridge.
At Perth Amboy, a tidewater terminal was built on the Arthur Kill comprising a large coal dock used to transport coal into New York City. These tracks were laid and the Easton and Amboy Railroad was opened for business on June 28, 1875, for hauling coal. The Easton and Amboy's operations were labeled the "New Jersey Division" of the Lehigh Valley Railroad. The Easton and Amboy had already completed large docks and facilities for shipping coal at Perth Amboy upon an extensive tract of land fronting the Arthur Kill. Approximately 350,000 tons of anthracite moved to Perth Amboy during that year for transshipment by water. Operations continued until the LV's bankruptcy in 1976.Deas, Wayne L. "PERTH AMBOY'S REBIRTH TIED TO PROJECT", The New York Times, August 16, 1987. May 4, 2015. "The first, already begun along the right of way of the Conrail and Lehigh Valley Railroads from Route 440, will consist of 168 condominium units. It will serve as a scenic entrance to Harbortown." The marshalling yard is now the residential area known as Harbortown.
Passenger traffic on the LV's Easton and Amboy connected with the Pennsylvania Railroad (PRR) at Metuchen, New Jersey and continued to the PRR'S Exchange Place terminus in Jersey City (that connection was discontinued in 1891 after the LV established its own route to Jersey City from South Plainfield).
The Easton and Amboy Railroad was ultimately absorbed into the parent Lehigh Valley Railroad.
The route which was constructed by the LV's Easton and Amboy still exists, but the rail line now stops at Manville, New Jersey. Past Manville, the route continues as a new rail line. The route from Manville to Perth Amboy (now Manville to Newark, New Jersey) was separated into a new rail line in 1999; the route from Manville to Easton continued as the original line. The Lehigh Line's Manville to Easton route is most popular among railfans; the Lehigh Line's original route from Easton to Allentown is the second-most popular.
In 1875, the LV financed the addition of a third track to the Erie Railroad main line so that cars could roll directly from colliery to the port at Buffalo. While the third track on the Erie Railroad main line between Waverly and Buffalo gave the LV an unbroken connection to Buffalo, the road's management desired its own line into Buffalo. The Geneva, Ithaca and Athens Railroad passed into the hands of the LV in September 1876, which extended from the New York state line near Sayre, Pennsylvania, to Geneva, New York, a distance of 75 miles.