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The Main Line of Public Works was a railroad and canal system across southern Pennsylvania between Philadelphia and Pittsburgh. Built between 1826 and 1834 by the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, it included the Philadelphia and Columbia Railroad, the Allegheny Portage Railroad and the Pennsylvania Canal system. The system was built at the urging of Philadelphia businessmen, who were vying with other coastal cities to become the United States' most important and influential port as the country's population expanded westward to the Ohio Country and Northwest Territory regions. The system would also open access to the newly opened Coal Region and the initial mines in the Wyoming Valley, which provided clean-burning anthracite coal to eastern cities that had already consumed much of the eastern forests for heating fuel. The rail portions of the system were authorized in 1828 by an act of the Pennsylvania General Assembly entitled ''An act relative to the Pennsylvania Canal, and to provide for the commencement of a Railroad to be constructed at the expense of the state and to be styled "The Pennsylvania Railroad"'' (Act of March 24, 1828, Pamph. Laws, p. 221).〔Churella, Albert J. ''The Pennsylvania Railroad, Volume 1, Building an Empire 1846-1917''. Philadelphia:The University of Pennsylvania Press (2012) pp. 2, 43〕〔''Compilation of the Laws of Pennsylvania relative to the Internal Improvements: together with the canal and railroad regulations, as established by the Board of Canal Commissioners'' Harrisburg:Barrett and Parke (1840), pp. 35-42〕〔Burgess, George H. and Kennedy, Miles C. (1949), ''Centennial History of the Pennsylvania Railroad Company'', Philadelphia: The Pennsylvania Railroad Company. p. 10, 96〕 Begun with Navigations construction along the Susquehanna and the West Fork of the Susquehanna with surveys for the best route over the barrier of the northern Allegheny Mountains, the system in time ran from Philadelphia on the Delaware estuary westwards across the great plain of southern Pennsylvania (goal of connecting the Susquehanna to New York City via canals) through Harrisburg and across the state to Pittsburgh and connected with other divisions of the Pennsylvania Canal. It consisted of the following principal sections, moving from east to west: *Philadelphia and Columbia Railroad: from Philadelphia to Columbia near the former ferry site known as Wright's Ferry, in Lancaster County. Originally expected to be a bona fide canal in the 1820s conception, the easternmost leg of the Pennsylvania Canal was to be a continuation of the first funded and more difficult to construct engineering navigations and construction farther west in less populated rural regions. The canal joining the Delaware and Susquehanna rivers was to run across the most populated expanse of Pennsylvania's Great Valley region (and so was delayed politically in part) but its planning was overtaken by the growth of railroad technology, which by the mid-1830s had demonstrated sufficient promise to adopt the new technology for the leg of the capability and funding and construction was shifted to a railroad—it was faster and cheaper to build above ground and make bridges than it was to dig a deep ditch and provide it with reliable water supplies to enable two way barge traffic. *Eastern Division Canal: from Columbia to Duncan's Island at the mouth of the Juniata River. *Juniata Division Canal: from Duncan's Island to Hollidaysburg *Allegheny Portage Railroad: from Hollidaysburg to Johnstown *Western Division Canal: from Johnstown to the terminus in Pittsburgh. The canals reduced travel time between Philadelphia and Pittsburgh from at least 23 days to just four.〔(【引用サイトリンク】url=http://bronte.wqed.org/tv/watch/onq/?id=672 )〕 The Main Line of Public Works was completed in 1834 and was sold to the Pennsylvania Railroad on June 25, 1857, for $7,500,000. Within a year, the PRR replaced the Philadelphia-Pittsburgh route with an entirely rail-based system.〔〔("Sale of the Main Line of Public Works of Pennsylvania" ) The New York ''Times'', June 26, 1857〕 ==Philadelphia and Columbia Railroad== (詳細はBroad and Vine Streets, ran north on Broad and west on Pennsylvania Avenue (a segment later taken over and submerged/tunneled over by the Reading Railroad), then headed northwest across the Columbia Bridge over the Schuylkill River. Just after crossing the river, it traveled up the Belmont Plane, an inclined plane in the current location of West Fairmount Park, and continued west across the eastern part of the state to Columbia, where the Columbia Plane headed down to the Susquehanna River. At that point, the eastern division of the canal continued north along the river and then west. The (Northern Liberties and Penn Township Railroad ) was incorporated in 1829 to build a branch continuing east on Noble Street and Willow Street to the Delaware River. This opened in 1834.〔(PRR Chronology, 1834 )〕 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Main Line of Public Works」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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