Buffalo & Susquehanna Railroad

Anyone have info on what type of structures were located at Hull or Cherry Springs ?

Photo sources ?

Thanks

Tom_E_Reynolds wrote: ...

http://books.google.com/books?id=uPfYAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA54
The Manual of statistics: stock exchange hand-book 1904

"A cut-off is projected from Hull to Cutler Summit, a distance of 22 miles, which will shorten the distance from the company's coal fields to Buffalo by about 16 miles, and will reduce grades and curvatures."

-Tom

I stumbled on this today:
http://books.google.com/books?id=z10aAQ ... pa&f=false
"Expense of engineer corps locating line from Null, Pa to Cutler Summit, Pa. 5651.95"

Also, a few lines earlier (to respond to Cactus Jack's post a few days ago):
"New water stations at Null, Pa. 1592.34"

I assume in both cases "Null' should be "Hull". These were from a Jan. 1906 report to the NY State Board of RR Commisioners, for fiscal year ending June 30 1905.
For some reason the station at Conrad was called Hull. Not sure which was there first - the town or the station.
JS
EDIT: apparently B&S was at this for few years. From the same report, 2 years earlier (1904 report for fiscal year ending June 30 1903);
http://books.google.com/books?id=wJ4lAQ ... er&f=false
"Expense of engineers' corps locating line from Hull, Pa to Cutler Summit, Pa. 987.75"

And from the 1905 report: http://books.google.com/books?id=8WUaAQ ... er&f=false
"Expense of engineering corps locating lines " ... "Hull, Pa to Cutler Summit, Pa. 1327.12"

I wonder if a copy of that survey exists in some archives somewhere? Heading more or less south from Cutler Summit (just south of Newfield Jct), it doesn't look too hard to find a fairly level path to stay up high (>2000 ft) and not going down into valleys and back up (VERY roughly, following Rooks Rd, Billy Lewis Rd, Cherry Spring Rd/Rte. 44), but then how to get into the valley of the E. Fork of the Sinnemahoning Creek to Hull, keeping the grade well under 2% (since most coal loads were going north), I have no idea.

Quite a bit of info, photos, etc. on the switchbacks section of the B&S : http://www.railroad.net/forums/viewtopi ... 28&t=81392

Paul Pietrak has maps of the line. He sells a little book with a map of the proposed line.

The "bypass" diverged near Austin, went to Coudersport and tied into the C&PA main.

Near Gold, a new line would be constructed to connect with the B&S main near Bingham. This avoided the dreaded Cutler Summit.

thebigham wrote:Paul Pietrak has maps of the line. He sells a little book with a map of the proposed line.

The "bypass" diverged near Austin, went to Coudersport and tied into the C&PA main.

Near Gold, a new line would be constructed to connect with the B&S main near Bingham. This avoided the dreaded Cutler Summit.

By "little book", do you mean his book on the "B&S"? I'll have to try and find one that is affordable.

The link from TOm Reynolds I quoted yesterday had a map that showed the proposed bypass going from Hull to Cutler Summit, and that is what the engineering expenses I mentioned yesterday were recorded as. But I guess those were just guesses until they found the best actual route. I look forward to seeing the map - it seems to me that to get from Austin (or Hull) to Coudersport you have to go up to the ridges (over 2000 ft or more) and down again (to 1600 or 1700 feet) , and then the same again from Coudersport to BIngham. I wonder if they found a route to only go up and down once.

JS

^No, I do not mean his B&S book.

Paul sells a pamphlet-like book with stations drawings, the switchback cut off route...

I picked it up at the WAG Conference in 2009.

thebigham wrote:^No, I do not mean his B&S book.

Paul sells a pamphlet-like book with stations drawings, the switchback cut off route...

I picked it up at the WAG Conference in 2009.

Thanks. Hmm, that will be a tough one for me to find. Nothing like that on e-bay or AMazon that I see....

Regarding the two climbs, it looks like if from Austin you go north up the valley of Freemans Run, to Odin (not a tough climb) then from just north of Odin one might tunnel north about 1-1/4 mile under the ridge ("Mina Hill") to the valley of Elm Flat, from which it is only about 100 feet of gentle downhill to the Allegheny valley where you could join the CPA main as you suggested for the climb up to Gold, which is not steep at all (about 1% I would guess). And it is not hard to pick out a route from Gold back to the B&S main north towards Bingham that stays about 100 feet lower than Cutler's summit or Newfield Jct. So in short a 1-1/4 mile tunnel would avoid one of the climbs. I wonder if a such a tunnel was in the plans...

JS

I dug out the maps.

One from Oct. 1904:

One line diverged from the Keating Summit line at Halls Summit at an elevation of 2,098 feet. The summit of the bypass was at 2,300 feet. It tied into the C&PA west of Mina.

The other diverged from Austin and went up Freeman Run. A tunnel at Mina Hill near Odin was at an elevation of 1,725 feet. It tied into the C&PA east of Mina.

Jan. 1911:

Line starts at Austin, tunnel at Odin, C&PA main until Raymond where a new line would be constructed to Hickox.

The present B&S line had a max grade of 2.8% percent and was 57 miles long.

The bypass was 43 miles long with a max grade of 1.2%.

thebigham wrote:I dug out the maps.

One from Oct. 1904:
One line diverged from the Keating Summit line at Halls Summit at an elevation of 2,098 feet. The summit of the bypass was at 2,300 feet. It tied into the C&PA west of Mina.

I can't find Halls Summit on my maps, but my guess is the followed modern Reed Run Rd from where it intersected the B&S near the summit on the switchback above Austin. Then following Reed Run Rd, around the east side of Lookout Mtn. After that, perhaps down along Reed Run Rd to join the CP&A west of Mina, but that seems way too steep going straight down through Reed Run. It must have wound around for a slower descent. In any case this is a route climbing up to the ridges twice.

The other diverged from Austin and went up Freeman Run. A tunnel at Mina Hill near Odin was at an elevation of 1,725 feet. It tied into the C&PA east of Mina.

That exactly is the tunnel I was speculating about. North of the tunnel hugging the hill on the NE side of Elm Flat, and then joining the CP&A between Mina and Olmsted, or just east of Olmsted when the CP&A crossed back to the south side of the river, to reduce the downhill grade from the tunnel to the river.

Jan. 1911: Line starts at Austin, tunnel at Odin, C&PA main until Raymond where a new line would be constructed to Hickox.

Probably going down the valley of the Middle Branch (modern Gold Rd/Rte 449) all the way to Hickox. Funny that they were still speculating about further improvements in 1911 on a line they first proposed in 1904 and never built.

Fun to think about what could have been - the cutoff could have been a game changer - might then have rivalled the PRR Keating Summit route (although still a bit higher than the PRR line over Keating Summit, the PRR line has grades well over 2% northbound (2.5%?), so 1.2% on the B&S would been a sure winner).
Thanks! JS

There was a three-story depot at Hull, PA. Paul Pietrak has a pic. We are not sure exactly where in Hull(aka Conrad) it was located. Hugh T. Guillaume

Conrad, PA (Hull) (or McFall) is at N 41.60732 W 77.89045 most likely place for station is at the benchmark

Even if the B&S built the bypass through Coudersport, once they got to Wellsville, they still had 90+ miles to Buffalo.

The PRR from Port Allegany to Buffalo was still shorter than the B&S by pass line from Coudersport to Buffalo.

The B&S also had a bypass plan for the 4 switchbacks between Wharton & Galeton.

Jan. 1911 map:

A tunnel would be built around switchback #2 under Cross Fork Junction and another tunnel would be built under Cherry Springs.

The max grade on the bypass would be 1.7% and the line would be be 28 miles long.

The switchback route was 32 miles long and had a max grade of 2.5%.

thebigham,

Is there a map of this proposed cutoff route we can view?

thebigham wrote:The B&S also had a bypass plan for the 4 switchbacks between Wharton & Galeton.
Jan. 1911 map:
A tunnel would be built around switchback #2 under Cross Fork Junction

Don't see what this would accomplish, unless it means to connect the Cross Forks Branch the main line. (not to replace the main line).
But the Cross Forks branch went out of service around then anyway.

and another tunnel would be built under Cherry Springs.

To get from the Sinnemahoning Valley (Wharton/Conrad/Hull etc) to the valley of West Br. Pine Creek (to Burrows and Galeton), you have to cross Route 44, which runs along the ridge high up.
I marked what might be the location for the shortest tunnel , from B to A. In the Cherry Springs area, more or less, about 1-1/4 miles long, at around 1800 ft elevation.
http://mapper.acme.com/?ll=41.66355,-77 ... ounty%20PA
JS