Transportation in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania

An early-settled part of the United States, and lying on the route between Philadelphia and Harrisburg, it has been the site of early experiments in canals, railroads, and highways.

[3] The Conestoga Navigation was 18 miles (29 km) long, with nine locks and dams, between Safe Harbor, at the mouth of the creek, and Lancaster.

[6] It was constructed by the state as part of the Main Line of Public Works, a combined rail and canal system connecting Philadelphia and Pittsburgh.

It also bought the Marietta and Portsmouth Railroad, under whose charter it built a branch, paralleling the river and canal, from Royalton to Columbia.

[6] Besides the canal, the Philadelphia and Columbia (and the new branch from Royalton) connected to the Columbia-Wrightsville Bridge, which provided rail access to the Northern Central Railway via the Wrightsville, York and Gettysburg Railroad.

[2] The threat, and intensive lobbying, was ultimately successful in persuading the Commonwealth to sell the entire Main Line of Public Works to the PRR in 1857.

This line would provide valuable service during the Civil War, particularly when the Philadelphia, Wilmington and Baltimore Railroad came under attack from Confederates and saboteurs or was simply jammed with traffic.

[6] The Columbia and Port Deposit Railroad also proposed to enter the county from the south, following the Susquehanna,[6] but its construction was long stalled by inadequate funds and the difficult, rocky bluffs along the river.

Born of the "narrow-gauge fever" then sweeping the country, it was conceived as a 3 ft 0 in (0.91 m) gauge line from Philadelphia to the Broad Top coal fields.

Subsisting on sparse local traffic, the Eastern Division was sold at a bankruptcy auction in September 1881 and reorganized as the Peach Bottom Railroad.

With the goal of low grades always in mind, the new branch was surveyed through an empty area of southern Lancaster County, without significant industries.

Turning to parallel the Susquehanna River, the new route descended to join the Columbia and Port Deposit Branch at Creswell.

[7] One oddity did appear in 1923: Samuel Strause opened a 3 ft 0 in (0.91 m) gauge logging operation at Penryn Park, a short portion of which extended into Lancaster County to transfer timber to the Cornwall & Mount Hope RR for shipment.

[6] Conrail's decision to divert Philadelphia-bound freight over the former Lebanon Valley Branch and Reading Company main line (to avoid interference with Amtrak) had left it with little or no traffic.

Conestoga Traction was an interurban trolley system that operated seven country routes radiating spoke-like from Lancaster, Pennsylvania, to numerous villages and towns.

By its connections to adjacent interurban trolley companies such as Philadelphia and West Chester (later Red Arrow and now today's SEPTA route 101), West Chester Street Railway, Schuylkill Valley Traction, Reading Transit, Hershey Transit, and Harrisburg Railways, one could ride trolleys from Philadelphia to Harrisburg, although slowly.

In the early part of the 1900s, Conestoga Traction was relatively fast and reliable transportation between towns in the days of horse-drawn wagons and buggies using rutted and muddy dirt roads.

A single CT car is preserved in working condition by the Manheim Historical Society, who operate it on a short stretch of track in their parking lot.

Many of these paths were connected with the Susquehannock people, whose main village was Conestoga (meaning at the place of the immersed pole), in what is now Manor Township in Lancaster County.

The Great Minquas Path went east from Conestoga to the Dutch, Swedish, and later British settlements in the Philadelphia and Chester area.

The path went east by way of Rockhill (at the ford of the Conestoga River) to Willow Street, Strasburg, and Gap, then entered Chester County.

It then entered Chester County and went through Elverson and Warwick to French Creek, which it followed to Bucktown and finally Phoenixville (on the Schuylkill River).

[19] An unnamed path led south from Conestoga along the Susquehanna River to a Native American village at modern Peach Bottom in the southwest corner of Lancaster County.

From Peach Bottom the path went through Wakefield, Oakryn, Little Britain, Oak Hill, Tayloria, and crossed Octoraro Creek into Chester County at Pine Grove.

James Logan traveled this path in 1705 to Peach Bottom and north to Conestoga on his first visit there, as did Governor John Evans.

From Bainbridge, the path went northeast through Donegal Springs and Mount Joy to Lancaster Junction, where it forded Chiques Creek.

Fording Conestoga River just south of the mouth of Cocalico Creek, the path led east to Center Square, Springville, and White Horse.

Crossing into Chester County, it passed through Compass, Wagontown, Siousca, and Thorndale, and reached Downington on the East Branch of Brandywine Creek.

There it headed west and slightly north, through Newberrytown, fording Yellow Breeches Creek into Cumberland County near Lisburn.

Despite the heavy subsidies, Air Midwest ended service on September 30, 2007, the day that its contract with the Lancaster Airport expired.