Mighty Rockville

Mighty Rockville. (Photo by Dave Augsberger.)

(Another case of not being able to publish last month. Written but no time to key in.)

—The September 2019 entry in my All-Pennsy color calendar is a Pennsy freight coming off the west end of Rockville Bridge over the Susquehanna River.
Leading is an EMD GP-9, trailed by an EMD B-unit version of its F-unit cab-unit freight diesel. (It looks like an F-7.)
The main reason the Pennsylvania Railroad was built was because PA’s Public-Works System was so cumbersome and time-consuming.
Public-Works was an early 19th-century response to the phenomenal success of NY’s Erie Canal, also a state effort.
NY’s Erie Canal was skonking all other east-coast seaports, like Boston, Philadelphia, and Baltimore. Baltimore’s response was the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad, our nation’s first common-carrier railroad. Opened to get Baltimore to the Ohio River — the midwest.
It could be said the Erie Canal was the main reason New York City became our nation’s premier ocean port. That canal also opened up trade with the midwest.
PA had impediments NY state didn’t have: mainly the Allegheny front, and also the Susquehanna River.
Public Works also wasn’t continuous like the Erie Canal. It took advantage of railroad already built from Philadelphia to the Susquehanna River. Then it canaled west, but had to portage over Allegheny Mountain, which couldn’t be canaled.
Plus the portage railroad over Allegheny Mountain had to use inclined planes. Grading and tunneling at that time were rudimentary.
Freight over Public Works had to be transloaded at least three times.
Small canal packets got loaded onto railroad flatcars for winching up and down the inclined planes.
Capitalists in Philadelphia were so upset with Public Works they founded a private common-carrier railroad = the Pennsylvania Railroad.
The challenge was immense. Philadelphia-to-Pittsburgh faced two natural barriers: Allegheny Mountain and the Susquehanna River. Much of the way could follow the Public Works canal-system, which used various mountain passes.
But Allegheny Mountain had no easy passes. It had been the barrier to east-west trade, which had to be done by packhorse.
John Edgar Thomson was brought back from GA to engineer continuous railroad across PA. (He had done railroads in the Philadelphia area.)
He followed prior experience, locating in valleys where there would be traffic. Then he used helper-locomotives to conquer Allegheny Mountain.
His route is still used. He also took advantage of a valley to loop the railroad, thereby easing the grade over Allegheny Mountain. That’s world-famous Horseshoe Curve.
He then merged railroads from the midwest to feed his railroad at Pittsburgh. Pennsy became immensely successful, becoming a main trading conduit between the east-coast megalopolis and the midwest.
Pennsy no longer exists. Long story: Penn-Central, then Conrail, now Norfolk Southern.
Getting a railroad from Harrisburg to Pittsburgh involved two major obstacles. Most challenging was the Allegheny Front. But there also was the Susquehanna River.
The Susquehanna is wide and shallow. It’s not navigable— which made bridging it fairly easy. A bridge didn’t need to be high enough to clear ships. Approach grading could be minimal.
But the Susquehanna is extremely wide. Rockville is 3,820 feet long, but bridge-piers can be on the river-bottom.
The first bridge was wood, and single-track I think. It quickly became a bottleneck as Pennsy became a trade-conduit.
The second bridge was iron, and double-track. But it too became a bottleneck, as evermore trade flowed over Pennsy.
By the end of the 19th century it became apparent more capacity was needed at that river-crossing.
Behold, Mighty Rockville, wide enough for four tracks (52 feet), and built with stone. 48 continuous 70-foot arches. I’ve seen it myself, and crossed it by train once.
Every time I see it I think “it would take a direct hit from a thermonuclear warhead to take out Mighty Rockville.”
It survived numerous floods and high water. But part of one arch-pillar washed out once,
Rockville opened in 1902, and is still in use. Who knows how many bridges across the Susquehanna came and went during its tenure. An interstate highway bridge is nearby, and in fact they considered building atop Mighty Rockville.
Thankfully they didn’t, but I bet in 100 years Mighty Rockville is still there, but that interstate highway bridge had to be replaced at least once, if not twice.
And Mighty Rockville is no longer four tracks, but it’s still wide enough for four.
And private capital built it, not the gumint (i.e. taxpayers).
Even Mighty Rockville got surpassed, but mainly because yarding in Harrisburg became constrained. Pennsy built up Enola yard across the river from Harrisburg, and it became a destination for freight to and from the midwest.
Freight-lines east of Enola were electrified; so Enola became a locomotive change. (Those railroad-lines are no longer electrified.)

• “Penn-Central” was a merger of Pennsy and arch-rival New York Central Railroad in 1968; although it also included New York, New Haven & Hartford (New Haven), per the gumint. New York Central was the other east-west trading conduit. Penn-Central went bankrupt in 1971.
• “Conrail” was our gumint’s response to the bankruptcy of many northeast railroads, primarily Penn-Central. Conrail was gumint at first, but eventually privatized. It was broken up and sold in 1999 to CSX Transportation and Norfolk Southern.
• “Thermonuclear warhead” = H-bomb.