(rshsdepot) PRR Schuylkill Branch Questions

[FRANKGARON_@_aol.com]

Took a Sunday drive last month up to the Pottsville, PA area - I had not been up there in years.

Some questions/comments:

1. It looks like they are going to widen Route 61 from the south side of Pottsville clear down to Schuylkill Haven to put in a center turn lane - and *possibly* build on the PRR ROW. All trees have been cleared, and Mount Carbon Yard is now wide open. 

Anybody know if this is the case? 


2. When did the coaling tower finally come down in Mount Carbon?


3. In Pottsville proper, right next to the Bus Station, there is a building that *sort* of looks like it might have been a PRR building - maybe frieght or Yard Office.
It's on the west side of the Bus Station. This would have been right where the now razed PRr station was. 

Anybody know if it was PRR related?


4. In Schuylkill Haven, my CT1000 shows a PRR/LV interchange track at MP 90.2. 

Can anybody help me place this location - nearest steets that it would have been near?


5. The ROW just above Saint Clair has a handy dandy Walmart Plaza built on it - this is new since last time I was up there. 


6. Did PRR use RDG trackage rights all the way from Wetherill Jct to Shenandoah, or did they have their own tracks from frackville north somehow?


7. Anybody know where the PRR station in Minersville was located? 


8. Does anybody know the last time the line from Delano Jct to Morea was used (I am guessing that LV was the last one to run on this line)? It seems to have been railbanked from at least 1984 or so.


9. Has anybody here ever walked the ROW from the Delano area thru Morea down to say St. Clair or so? I am interested in doing this sometime - but wondering what bridges are out, and if there are trespassing concerns at Morea Colliery?


10. In Hazleton proper, they list a PRR freight station at MP 122.5 - this interests me because I believe that this trackage was always owned by LV (w/PRR having trackage rights).

Anybody know where this was, streetwise, and what it looked like?


11. Did the tracks ever run west of Scotch Valley and connect with the line from Sunbury to Wilkes Barre or something? A topo map and an NRHS Bulletin that I have infers this, but does not seem to come out and say it. 


12. Anybody else on the list have a good handle on what stuctures are still up north of Norristown? Doesn't seem to be hardly anything left - except for
Birdsboro, Mohrsville and Shoemakersville? 

Thanks,

Frank

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