While we were on our vacation to Appalachia last month, visiting our share of train-watching places, we encountered a highway in a number of places: U.S. Route 220.
I looked at our road atlas again, and decided that this, perhaps more than many others, is one road that railfans should know about, and not for the usual reasons. It’s nothing like U.S. 30 following the UP Overland, or U.S. 34 along the Q through Illinois. In fact, despite the fact that it carries an even number, it runs primarily north and south across five states, in a land of mostly east-west railroads.
It begins near the northern border of Pennsylvania at Sayre, at one time the site of major shops for the Lehigh Valley Railroad. From there it heads southwest, encountering Altoona…the operational heart of the Pennsylvania Railroad. Crossing into Maryland, it isn’t long before the road goes through Cumberland, still a major shop and yard town for the old Baltimore & Ohio, and at one time for the Western Maryland as well.
After passing through West Virginia’s eastern “panhandle”, the highway enters Virginia, eventually reaching Clifton Forge, an important division point on the old Chesapeake & Ohio. Continuing southward for only about 50 miles, you next come to Roanoke, the heart and brains for the original Norfolk & Western, and also important to N&W’s old competitor, the Virginian, pre-merger.
Route 220 continues south through Virginia and nearly all the wa
From Sayre south it follows the former LV main to Towanda, sometimes at tie level and others high and away from the railroad. From Towanda it follows the old LV Sullivan and State Line to Monroeton where today track ends. As you move south you still following the route into New Albany; the railroad goes around the mountain to the east while you go up and over to Dushore where the railroad was up to your left…see stations at Monroeton, New Albany (also box car) and Dushore. Going through town the railroad was parallel to the east and away from 220 for good. However, the Williamsport and Northern ROW can be seen often from Lopez to Hughsville. West to Williamsport, Lock Haven and MIlesburg will put you along side RDG, PRR, and NYC trackage and ROW’s then the Bald Eagle Br of the PRR to Tyrone and ALtoona…that’s enough for one day’s drive anyway! Do it before spring foliage or after the leaves fall in October in order to see…
…Have made many trips up the valley from below Shellsburg to connect to rt. 220 on our way up to Lock Haven. The road certainly does parallel the Bald Eagle branch up thru that valley for some distances…When we were doing it the line still had the big black circles of position signal lights of Penn RR. What used to be 220 right into Lock Haven changed to rt. 150 many years ago at Milesburg, as rt 220 was shifted to follow I-80 northeast, and then around Lock Haven via a spur off that interstate and it swings around the east side of Lock Haven.
In thinking back quite a ways in time, I believe I remember seeing steam up thru there on the B E RR…and I don’t mean the K-4 of recent years. What was it…1361…? The number may not be correct as I don’t have it in front of me right now.
We were driving an almost new then…1949 Fleetline Chevy in early trips up thru there to Lock Haven to visit family. So steam was still around yet…
Also Wikipedia has in fo on the history of the N&BE RR (nee: B&BEV RR) as well. THat Altoona, Snow Shoe, Locke Have area is really sceniic country and some pretty challenging terraine for railroading.
Interesting observation, Carl - and “connecting of the dots”, too - well-written to boot ! As support for your thesis: Many years ago we planned a late-afternoon trip from the Binghamton, NY area to Altoona via 220 most of the way, mainly to follow the railroad lines. (But that was too ambitious for the late start that day, and we got only as far as the Laporte/ Eagles Mere/ World’s End State Park area before we had to stop for the night, as we had to be eastwards over in the Poconos the next day . . . Took almost 20 years after that to get back to the Horseshoe Curve again . . . [sigh] )
And reinforcing your key point: From up in the Muncy Valley - Laporte area of Pennsylvania to at least as far as Lock Haven, US Rt. 220 is designated as the “Appalachian Throughway”.
Back a little eastwards, “old” 220 - before it was relocated to I-180 for about 5 miles - came parallel to the PRR first about 10 miles east of Williamsport, in between Muncy and Montoursville, then the RDG and NYC, etc. railroads. Farther west towards Lock Haven, 220 still passes through Jersey Shore (!) and Avis, a former PRR shop town. A little further on at Mill Hall, 220 swings further south and becomes co-located with I-80 and then I-99 past Altoona and southwards. In its stead, today PA Rt. 150 = “N. Eagle Valley Rd.” is the designation for the former 220 route from Mill Hall southwesterly to Milesburg; after that, it’s just “S. Eagle Valley Rd.” to Tyrone. But for most of the distance to Tyrone, that road is close to the Nittany & Bald Eagle RR, which now operates the former PRR route there. From Tyrone to Altoona, the roads parallel the NS / former PRR “Middle Division” main line - but what was 220 is now 724 = “E. Pleasant Valley Blvd.”, and it’s not much closer to the tracks than 'new" 220/ I-99, either.
Thanks for posting this somewhat unusual observation and correlation !
On our trip, we only used 220 between Roanoke and Clifton Forge (both ways), but we encountered it again at Cumberland. We’d been advised to use it to get from Cumberland to Bedford, Pennsylvania, but we used a state highway instead to follow the old B&O up to Hyndman, then to Bedford.
Geology freaks (and I know there are some among us!) would also appreciate this highway. We encountered both a syncline and an anticline (and I had to look up which was which!) in our travels. You hardly have to look for them–they’re both prominent and very dramatic. The anticline is just southeast of Clifton Forge, where the James River (and the C&O and 220) cut through the mountain. The syncline, even more spectacular, is north of Cumberland. Not sure which river was responsible for carving through the mountain here, but wow!
I also forgot to mention that Route 220, between Cumberland and Clifton Forge, hits another good railroad town: Keyser, West Virginia, on the old B&O. We didn’t get there on this trip, but that’s even more reason to go this route someday!
Have you ever tried US 23? It plays tag with the N&W and C&O South of Columbus OH and stays close to the N&W into Porsmouth. South of there it plays tag with many coal branches and goes through many company towns in KY.
I am partial to Nickel Plate Avenue in Valparaiso, In. The road runs only about 200 yards, but parallels the old NKP line, with a signal strategically located to indicate train movements.
I wouldnt trust any 2 lane highway in WVA unless an entire day was available for a couple hundred miles (or less).
Pail…don’t dismiss Eagle’s Mere as non railroad…there was a narrow gauge passenger railroad that met Williamsport and Northern trains at the bottom of the hill at Sonestown! A special writers project by PA in the 50’s and 60’s created about 15 or 20 great works based on the Lumber Industry. Not only were there rails laid, picked up, and laid somewhere else again and maybe brought back to the original location again just to get the tree trunks to a mill, but there were several local chartered railroads, too, like the Williamsport and Northern, the New York and Pennsylvania, the Susquehanna and New York, the Barclay RR, the stillborn Pittsburg, Binghamton and Eastern (chartered, road bed graded from Canton to Monroton along US 6, track laid at Canton, big locomotive purchased and paraded around Canton, then died) are among them. The LV from Towanda to Dushore to Mildred, Lopez, to Noxin, and Harvey’s Lake was another series of shortlines cobbled together. The area west and south of Binghamton, NY, into Pennsylvania and west to virtually Ohio is loaded with all kinds of dreams and schemes of yesterday which demanded the use of two rails at many different gauges. After the leaves fall and before they return is an excellent time to ply the woods for remnants of these lines and trails…but beware of giant leaps of land where high brides or lumber tresstleing betrays a right of way. Good stop for the whole family in better weather is the Lumberman’s Museum in Potter County between Galeton and Coudersport on Route 6.