Complete information about visiting the Allegheny Portage Railroad National Historic Site is now available on National Park Planner!
The Allegheny Portage Railroad National Historic Site is located near Cresson and Gallitzin, Pennsylvania. The park commemorates one of America’s early technological achievements. Faced with losing business to New York’s Erie Canal during the rush to move people and goods to the west, the state of Pennsylvania opted to build its own canal from Philadelphia to Pittsburgh. Only the Allegheny Mountains stood in the way.
The canal would be dug from two sides of the mountain, with the eastern leg running from Philadelphia to Hollidaysburg and the western leg running from Pittsburgh to Johnstown. The gap between the two ends of the canal presented the challenge of how to move canal boats over the mountain. The solution was to build a “railroad,” not a railroad in the traditional sense of the word, but an incline railroad powered by steam engines that could take a canal boat out of the water on one side of the canal, place it on a rail car, and through a series of short inclines, pull it up the mountain and lower it down the other side where it could be placed back into the canal so that it could finish its journey east or west across Pennsylvania.
HISTORY OF THE ALLEGHENY PORTAGE RAILROAD
DIRECTIONS AND CONTACT INFORMATION
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Last updated on September 11, 2024
