Gravel Place, Pennsylvania
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
 Gravel Place switching tower, 2015 | |
  | |
| Location | |
|---|---|
| Location | Arlington Heights, Pennsylvania, U.S. |
| Coordinates | 41°01′06″N 75°11′44″W / 41.01833°N 75.19556°W |
| Characteristics | |
| Type | Locomotive |
| History | |
| Opened | 1882 |
| Closed | c. 1950 |
| Original | Delaware, Lackawanna and Western Railroad |
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Gravel Place is a location within Arlington Heights, Pennsylvania, about three miles (4.8 km) northeast of East Stroudsburg. It is neither incorporated nor a census-designated place, but has a name recognized by the USGS.[1] From the 1880s to about 1950, it was a railroad yard of the Delaware, Lackawanna and Western Railroad (DL&W) on its mainline from Hoboken Terminal in New Jersey, which served New York City by ferry, to Scranton, Pennsylvania, continuing northwest into New York State with its western terminus in Buffalo, New York. It is just north of present Mill Creek Road.
The New York, Susquehanna and Western Railway (NYS&W) was formed in June, 1881 through the merger of several small railroads. It had an agreement with the DL&W which called for the DL&W to haul coal from mines in northeastern Pennsylvania, primarily from Pennsylvania Anthracite Coal Company and Lackawanna Coal Company mines near Scranton, to an interchange with the NYS&W at Gravel Place. The NYS&W would take it farther east to an interchange with the Pennsylvania Railroad in New Jersey, from which it would travel to the port of Edgewater, New Jersey for shipment to customers. By 1882, the NYS&W had laid track from Weehawken, New Jersey to Gravel Place, where it established a connection with the DL&W. To complete the last few miles and reach Gravel Place, a bridge was constructed across the Delaware River in the Delaware Gap. The coal-hauling operation began the day after the line was finished.[2][3]
After a decade, the NYS&W decided to end the agreement with the DL&W. In 1892, the NYS&W formed a subsidiary, the Wilkes-Barre and Eastern Railroad (WB&E), to reach the mines directly. The new WB&E line from Stroudsburg to Wilkes-Barre was completed in 1894, and the NYS&W removed the short segment of track between Stroudsburg and Gravel Place.[2][3]