Its tracks were transferred to Conrail and the Southeastern Pennsylvania Transportation Authority (SEPTA) in 1976.

Construction began on June 16, 1853; the company changed its name to the North Pennsylvania Railroad on October 3 that year.

The new name reflected the grand (and unrealized) ambitions of the company to extend all the way across Pennsylvania to Waverly, New York and a junction with the Erie Railroad.

The railway opened between Front and Willow Streets, Philadelphia and Gwynedd on July 2, 1855, a distance of 18+1⁄2 miles (29.8 km).

[1] The branch carried little traffic; the North Pennsylvania leased it that same year to the Lehigh Valley and Delaware Water Gap Railroad as part of a stillborn venture to build a new route through Easton to a junction with the Delaware, Lackawanna and Western Railroad.