There were a a few lines...
Coming east from the Blairstown area, mostly on the south/east side
of the Paulins Kill was the NYSW mainline. About a mile East of
COlumbia it forked. The north branch was the Lehigh and New England (LNE) mainline, which stayed on the north side of the Paulins Kill and went
right through COlubmia and over the Delaware to Portland.
Look at
http://www.terraserver-usa.com/image.as ... ia%7cnj%7c and nearby --- the dotted purple line is the one we are talking about.
To the east of this junction the LNE used the NYSW mainline for some distance into NJ
East of the the junction I mentioned above, the NYSW mainline continued on the south of the Paulins Kill. CLoser to the Delaware River it forked again, with the mainline curving north along the Delaware, going back
across the Paulins KIill, and under the LNE in Columbia itself. THis
went north along the Delaware R and somewhere just north of the
Highway 80 bridget across the delaware R the NYSW crossed, going to Stroudsburg/Gravel
Place, where it connected with the WIlkes-Barre and Eastern, to get
to the Scranton/WIlkesbarre coal area. THis part along the river
north of COlumbia was mostly wiped out by 80, I think, but I don't
know details like the earlier poster.
The south fork of the second fork went south along the Delaware to a
place called "Delaware, about 1/2 way between COlumbia dn Mununka
CHunk. It ened there. I don't see the place on the terraserver map I listed above, it must have been just north of Ramseyburg on the map.
Part of this section is what is now covered by 46, I think (especially
north of the DLW bridge south of columbia up to the Paulins Kill).
Related to all this, at Manunka CHunk, the old DLW main came in to
the riverside coming north through tunnels. It then ran north, past the
town of Delaware, and then over the Delaware R on the bridge I just mentioned. The Portland PA power plant is right by this bridge now, I think trains
on the PA side sometimes back onto the bridge when switching, but
nothing in NJ is used (or even left!)
ALso, the Penn RR Bel-Del branch came north
along the river from the south, and ended at Manunka CHunk when
they connected with the DLW (maybe they went as far as this town
Delaware??).
The DLW "cutoff" track and famous viaduct were just north of Columbia,
of course, but not connected to any lowly NYSW track. THey crossed
east of columbia a few miles.
A good view of the NYSW track is ta
http://www.historical.maptech.com/quad. ... &series=15
CLick on 1942 Northeast quad.
Hope I got most of it right, JS