Coke Region Lines
The bulk of West Penn Railways' trackage formed a network in Allegheny, Westmoreland, and Fayette counties of Pennsylvania, comprising 158 miles (254 km) in 1917, with headquarters in Connellsville. The main line ran from Greensburg, through Hecla (now known as Southwest), Mount Pleasant, Scottdale, Connellsville, and Uniontown, a distance of 31 miles (50 km). This trip took 2 hours 25 minutes, with service provided every half hour. The speed averaged approximately 13 miles per hour (21 km/h), including stops. The ridership was almost entirely local in nature; most passengers rode only a few miles (mainly from their homes to the nearest town for shopping, or to go to work). Service ended on August 9, 1952.
The phrase "Coke Region" is based on the area's fame for producing coke (fuel) from coal. The coke industry suffered a major blow in the 1920s after byproduct ovens were built near the Pittsburgh steel mills, rendering the "beehive" facilities that dotted West Penn's territory nearly obsolete. As a result the trolleys had fewer passengers to take to work, and the decline began in earnest.
Branches and minor lines were as follows. (Date of last rail service is in parentheses.)
- McKeesport - Wilmerding (1904)
- McKeesport - Lincoln Way (1924)
- Locust Street, McKeesport (1925)
- Jerome Street, McKeesport (1928)
- Scottdate - Meadow Mill (1931)
- Boston - Scott Haven (1932)
- Greensburg - Bunker Hill (1934)
- Tarr - Mount Pleasant (1936)
- Irwin - McKeesport (1938)
- Greensburg - Hunker - Scottdale (1939)
- Larimer - Trafford (1942)
- Irwin - Larimer (1948)
- Uniontown - Brownsville (1950)
- Uniontown - Martin (1950)
- Uniontown - Fairchance (1950)
- Connellsville - Dickerson Run (1951)
- Connellsville - Phillips - Uniontown (parallel to the main line but separate) (1951)
- Irwin - Greensburg (1952)
- Latrobe - Hecla (now Southwest) (1952)
- Connellsville - South Connellsville (1952)
Read more about this topic: West Penn Railways
Famous quotes containing the words coke, region and/or lines:
“Name me, if you can, a better feeling than the one you get when you’ve half a bottle of Chivas in the bag with a gram of coke up your nose and a teenage lovely pulling off her tube top in the next seat over while you’re doing a hundred miles an hour in a suburban side street.”
—P.J. (Patrick Jake)
“In that region there were shepherds living in the fields, keeping watch over their flock by night. Then an angel of the Lord stood before them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified.”
—Bible: New Testament, Luke 2:8,9.
“Every living language, like the perspiring bodies of living creatures, is in perpetual motion and alteration; some words go off, and become obsolete; others are taken in, and by degrees grow into common use; or the same word is inverted to a new sense or notion, which in tract of time makes an observable change in the air and features of a language, as age makes in the lines and mien of a face.”
—Richard Bentley (1662–1742)