Erie Branch South of Susquehanna, PA

SPV's RR Atlas of the Northeast has an Erie line from Susquehanna, PA, to the Scranton area.

I went to Topozone.com. The topo maps there do not show an abandoned railroad grade.

I went to the old PA topo map site. The 1892 topo map there didn't even have the tracks on it.

When was this line built? When was it abandoned?

Thanks,

Chris

The Erie line ran from the main at JF (just west of the viaduct) to Scranton and was sold to the D&H in the mid 1950's. D&H had trackage rights before then; the Erie retained trackage rights thereafter. D&H abandoned the line in when they purchased the DL&W south (east) of Binghamton in the early 80's.

Chris -

Do you mean the Jefferson RR (nee Div.) that left the mainline EAST of Susquehanna at Lanesboro, PA?

This connection left the Erie Mainline just before the Starucca Viaduct at JA Tower and ran down grade to the Jefferson RR, which was also in use by the D&H as their PA Div. mainline. Roughly speaking, the joint trackage ran from the "Lanesboro Connector" at the bottom of the grade to Carbondale, where the Erie and D&H parted ways again. The last time trains ran on this line was in the mid 1980's when the D&H closed BElden Hill Tunnel, and trains needed to do a back up move via the connector to access Binghamton.

There was no branch that ran south out of Susquehanna proper.

CF

There must a huge error in that early SPV atlas then!

I know about the D&H line that went under Starrucca and down to Carbondale.

The SPV atlas has the line going south through Gibson, Clifford and Tompkinsville.

Thanks for your help!

Chris

This is at least the second time this SPV map and its mistakes have been brought up in these forums. The D&H line is post 1955 after having bought the Jefferson Division from the Erie from Jefferson Jct. to Carbondale with the Erie maintianinl local switching rights (peddler ran north everyday and returned, with rights all the way into Susquehanna rarely used beyond Jeff. Jct. and JA). The line ran from Jeff. Jct. to Brandt, Stevens Point, Starrucca, Thompson, Arrarat, Forest City, etc,to Carbondale. The line you are looking at via Gibson, Clifford, and Thompsonville is in error except that it may go through townships in those names but not the known villages.

I'm sure this mistake has been corrected in later editions of the atlas. I have the 1st Edition. I lost the 2nd Edition. The latest edition just came out.

I asked exactly the same question about the same line several years ago somewhere on these railroad.net forums, and got the same answer that it was an error pure and simple. In the SPV 2nd edition (already out at the time but I didn't have it yet) it was corrected (the line was removed). This was not the old D&H line being discussed but something further west. JS