Conemaugh Line


The Conemaugh Line is a rail line owned and operated by the Norfolk Southern Railway in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania. The line runs from Conpit Junction northwest and southwest to Pittsburgh, following the Conemaugh, Kiskiminetas, and Allegheny rivers, on the former main line of the Conemaugh Branch of the Pennsylvania Railroad. At its east end, it merges with the Pittsburgh Line; its west end is where it merges with the Fort Wayne Line at the northwestern tip of Allegheny Commons Park. The line was used by the PRR as a low-grade alternate to its main line in the Pittsburgh area.

History

A short branch of the Pennsylvania Railroad from Torrance to Blairsville opened in 1851; only a small piece of this at Blairsville is still in use. The Western Pennsylvania Railroad opened from Blairsville west to Saltsburg in 1863 and to Kiskiminetas Junction in 1864 or 1865. The line from Freeport to Allegheny opened in 1866. A new, more direct line east from Blairsville was built by the Western Penn in the early 1880s, meeting the PRR main line at Bolivar. The PRR's Sang Hollow Extension, now only part of the Conemaugh Line west of Conpit Junction, opened east to Johnstown in 1876; the portion east of Conpit Junction was operated as a one-way line for westbound freight. All of the aforementioned lines became part of the PRR through leases and mergers, became Penn Central in 1968, and were taken over by Conrail in 1976. In the 1999 breakup of Conrail, the line was assigned to Norfolk Southern.
Around 1950, a portion of the line was relocated to a higher elevation, as part of a flood control project on the Conemaugh River. The previous alignment would later become the bulk of the West Penn Trail.
The Conemaugh Line is notable for being the recipient of a variation of the PRR's cab signal system in 1940, which eliminated the wayside signals between interlockings from Conpit Junction to Kiski Junction, requiring operation of trains by cab signal indication only. This system, modified by Conrail to operate bidirectionally, continues to be used by Norfolk Southern on this part of the Conemaugh Line; the section from Kiski to Pittsburgh also uses bidirectional signaling, however this section uses wayside signals but is NOT cab-signal energized. As of October of 2017 upgrade work to the Conemaugh Line has begun, and the entire line from Pittsburgh to Conpit will be Cab Signal Only with new Safetran Signals at just the interlockings, with a new Control point being put in around LC 60.0. The entire line is remotely dispatched by Traffic Control System.