Newtown Square Branch

The Newtown Square Branch was a branch line of the Pennsylvania Railroad that diverged from the West Chester Branch in Yeadon, Pennsylvania, and ended in Newtown Square, Pennsylvania. The rail line is mostly overgrown and few bridges remain, with the bridge over Baltimore Avenue located at the Upper Darby/East Lansdowne border having been removed in 2003. The only known presence of rails is at the junction just west of the SEPTA's Fernwood-Yeadon Station. Through Upper Darby Township the former right-of-way follows PECO's high tension power lines from Fernwood to the Upper Darby/Haverford border at Lansdowne Avenue and Township Line Road.

Built as the Philadelphia & Delaware County Railroad in 1888, it was taken over by a subsidiary of the Pennsylvania Railroad in 1894. The Cardington Branch to Millbourne Mills opened the following year in 1895. Passenger service ran on the line until it was terminated in 1908 due to competition from the West Chester Traction Company trolley lines.

The Newtown Square Branch consisted of yards at Pembroke just past Fernwood Junction and seven stations. The stations were Garrett Road, Arlington, Llanerch, Grassland, Brookethorpe, Foxcroft, The Hunt and Newtown Square. Major bridges were at Baltimore Avenue, Naylor's Run, Darby Creek, and Bryn Mawr Avenue. The stone piers from the bridge over Darby creek are still extant, while huge concrete abutments remain visible on the west side of Bryn Mawr Avenue south of the Goshen Road intersection - remnants of the railroad bridge that carried the line over Bryn Mawr Avenue at that location.

Service past Grassland station stopped in 1963, and all service on the line ceased by 1981. Rails had been removed from the line by Conrail in 1985, along with most of the bridges. The right of way is still mostly intact, though it is largely overgrown with weeds and trees. In some cases, private business has obliterated portions of the line. There do remain several areas where the right of way is accessible to the public, mainly in Naylor Run Park in Upper Darby Township.

At the intersection of Darby Road and West Chester Pike, Haverford Township has created a small park, Llanerch Crossing Park. The Park commemorates the "Battle of Llanerch Junction", an 1895 confrontation at that site between track workers from the Pennsylvania Railroad and the West Chester Rail Company. Interpretive signs and two murals describe the history of Llanerch Junction.

The western terminus of the line was the Powell Lumber Yard on Newtown Street Road in Newtown Square, Pa. The lumber yard burned down in the 1980s. The old freight station was threatened with demolition in the late 1990s. The Newtown Square Historical Preservation Society raised money to have the old freight station moved to its current location west of town at the Drexel Lodge property on West Chester Pike. The Newtown Square Railroad Museum has been created at that location, with engines and other rolling stock, and memorabilia related to the Newtown Square Branch railroad.