Steeler (train)

Last updated
Morning Steeler;Afternoon Steeler
Overview
Service type Inter-city rail
StatusDiscontinued
Locale Midwestern United States
First service1948
Last service1958
Former operator(s) Pennsylvania Railroad
Route
Termini Cleveland, Ohio
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
Distance travelled138.1 miles (222.3 km)
Service frequencyDaily (morning and afternoon itineraries)
Train number(s)Morning Steeler 360, eastbound, 363 westbound
Afternoon Steeler 362 eastbound, 361 westbound
On-board services
Seating arrangementscoach
Catering facilities dining lounge cars
Observation facilities parlor cars
Route map
BSicon exKBHFa.svg
Cleveland
BSicon KBHFxa.svg
Euclid Avenue
BSicon exSTR+l.svg
BSicon eABZg+r.svg
BSicon exKBHFe.svg
BSicon STR.svg
Akron
BSicon BHF.svg
Hudson
BSicon BHF.svg
Alliance
BSicon STR+GRZq.svg
BSicon KBHFe.svg
Pittsburgh

The Morning Steeler and Afternoon Steeler were a pair of passenger trains operated by the Pennsylvania Railroad between Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania's Union Station and Cleveland, Ohio's Pennsylvania Station, the former Union Depot. The original Steeler was at one time the fastest train between the two cities, but the service lasted less than a dozen years.

The service began on December 12, 1948 as the Steeler, a single round-trip between Pittsburgh and Cleveland. It departed Cleveland in the morning and returned from Pittsburgh in the late afternoon. Its travel time of 2 hours and 40 minutes was, at the time, the fastest between the two cities. At first the Steeler made just two intermediate stops, in Alliance and Hudson, Ohio. [1] On April 30, 1950, the Pennsylvania inaugurated a second round-trip between the two cities, adding a morning departure from Pittsburgh and a corresponding afternoon return from Cleveland. [2] The morning pair were dubbed the Morning Steeler and the afternoon pair the Afternoon Steeler. Pittsburgh Steelers head coach John Michelosen was on hand to christen the new service. [2] Prior to this the Pennsylvania had five daily round-trips between the two cities: the Steeler, Clevelander, and three additional unnamed pairs. The Steeler carried both a parlor and a "dining lounge" car in addition to coaches. [3] :241

The Pennsylvania discontinued the Morning Steeler on September 7, 1957. The railroad cited competition from the newly completed Ohio Turnpike; daily patronage had fallen to 35 and yearly losses totaled $41,000. Its discontinuance left two Pennsylvania trains, the Afternoon Steeler and the Clevelander, between Pittsburgh and Cleveland. [4] [5] :6 The Afternoon Steeler survived another year, ending on June 28, 1958. [6] At the insistence of the Pennsylvania Utility Commission a rump version of the Steeler continued to operate as a commuter train to Beaver Falls, Pennsylvania until late July. [7]

Related Research Articles

The Pennsylvania Railroad was an American Class I railroad that was established in 1846 and was headquartered in Philadelphia. Named for the commonwealth it was established in, by 1882, the Pennsylvania Railroad had become the largest railroad, the largest transportation enterprise, and the largest corporation in the world. Its budget was second only to the U.S. government.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Northeast Corridor Line</span> Commuter rail line in New Jersey and New York

The Northeast Corridor Line is a commuter rail service operated by NJ Transit between the Trenton Transit Center and New York Penn Station on Amtrak's Northeast Corridor in the United States. The service is the successor to Pennsylvania Railroad commuter trains between Trenton and New York, and is NJ Transit's busiest commuter rail service. After arrival at New York Penn Station, some trains load passengers and return to New Jersey, while others continue east to Sunnyside Yard for storage. Most servicing is done at the Morrisville Yard, at the west end of the line. The Northeast Corridor Line is colored red on NJ Transit system maps and its symbol is the State House. The Princeton Branch is a shuttle service connecting to the line. Connecting SEPTA Trenton Line service between Philadelphia and Trenton is listed in the timetable.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Pennsylvania Railroad class S1</span> American experimental duplex 6–4-4-6 locomotive

The PRR S1 class steam locomotive was a single experimental duplex locomotive of the Pennsylvania Railroad. It was designed to demonstrate the advantages of duplex drives espoused by Baldwin Chief Engineer Ralph P. Johnson. It was the longest and heaviest rigid frame reciprocating steam locomotive that was ever built. The streamlined Art Deco styled shell of the locomotive was designed by Raymond Loewy.

The Pittsburgh and Lake Erie Railroad (P&LE), also known as the "Little Giant", was formed on May 11, 1875. Company headquarters were located in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The line connected Pittsburgh in the east with Youngstown, Ohio in the Haselton neighborhood in the west and Connellsville, Pennsylvania to the east. It did not reach Lake Erie until the formation of Conrail in 1976. The P&LE was known as the "Little Giant" since the tonnage that it moved was out of proportion to its route mileage. While it operated around one tenth of one percent of the nation's railroad miles, it hauled around one percent of its tonnage. This was largely because the P&LE served the steel mills of the greater Pittsburgh area, which consumed and shipped vast amounts of materials. It was a specialized railroad deriving much of its revenue from coal, coke, iron ore, limestone, and steel. The eventual closure of the steel mills led to the end of the P&LE as an independent line in 1992.

The Pittsburgh, Fort Wayne and Chicago Railway was a major part of the Pennsylvania Railroad system, extending the PRR west from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, via Fort Wayne, Indiana, to Chicago, Illinois. It included the current Norfolk Southern-owned Fort Wayne Line east of Crestline, Ohio, to Pittsburgh, and the Fort Wayne Secondary, owned by CSX, from Crestline west to Tolleston in Gary, Indiana. CSX leased its entire portion in 2004 to the Chicago, Fort Wayne and Eastern Railroad (CFE). The remaining portion of the line from Tolleston into Chicago is now part of the Norfolk Southern's Chicago District, with a small portion of the original PFW&C trackage abandoned in favor of the parallel lines of former competitors which are now part of the modern NS system.

Pennsylvania Station is a name applied by the Pennsylvania Railroad (PRR) to several of its grand passenger terminals. Several are still in active use by Amtrak and other transportation services; others have been demolished.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Pennsylvania Company</span>

The Pennsylvania Company, later known publicly as the Pennsylvania Lines was a major holding company. It included the Pittsburgh, Fort Wayne and Chicago Railway, the PRR's main route to Chicago. It also owned but did not operate the Pittsburgh, Cincinnati, Chicago and St. Louis Railroad, another line to Chicago. It merged back into the Pennsylvania Railroad in 1918.

The Pennsylvania Railroad's class P5 comprised 92 mixed-traffic electric locomotives constructed 1931–1935 by the PRR, Westinghouse and General Electric. Although the original intention was that they work many passenger trains, the success of the GG1 locomotives meant that the P5 class were mostly used on freight. A single survivor, prototype #4700, is at the National Museum of Transportation in St Louis, Missouri.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Pennsylvania Railroad class O1</span>

The Pennsylvania Railroad's class O1 comprised eight experimental boxcab electric locomotives built in 1930 and 1931. They were built in preparation for the New York to Washington Electrification project. They had the wheel arrangement classified as 4-4-4 in the Whyte notation. Although successful, they were not powerful enough for the railroad's increasingly heavy trains. For production, the PRR chose to concentrate on the P5 class, effectively an enlarged and more powerful version of the O1 with an additional pair of driving wheels.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Pennsylvania Railroad class DD2</span>

The Pennsylvania Railroad's class DD2 electric locomotive was a single prototype locomotive never placed into series production. It was intended as an improved and simplified GG1 for use on the planned, but never built, extension of the PRR's electrification west of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. The one locomotive produced was numbered #5800 and used in regular Baltimore tunnel helper service until it was scrapped in September 1962.

The Pennsylvania Railroad's class L6 comprised three electric locomotives of 2-8-2 wheel arrangement in the Whyte notation. The intention was to build a whole class of freight boxcab locomotives using this design, but the displacement of class P5a to freight work after the introduction of the GG1 meant that there was little need for more electric freight locomotives.

The Conemaugh Line is a rail line owned and operated by the Norfolk Southern Railway in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania. The line runs from Conpit Junction, Pennsylvania northwest and southwest to Pittsburgh, following the Conemaugh, Kiskiminetas, and Allegheny rivers, on the former main line of the Conemaugh Branch of the Pennsylvania Railroad (PRR). At its east end, it merges with the Pittsburgh Line; its west end is where it merges with the Fort Wayne Line at the northwestern tip of Allegheny Commons Park. The line was used by the PRR as a low-grade alternate to its main line, which is now part of Norfolk Southern's Pittsburgh Line, in the Pittsburgh area.

The Fort Wayne Line and Fort Wayne Secondary is a rail line owned and operated by the Norfolk Southern Railway (NS), Chicago, Fort Wayne and Eastern Railroad (CFE), and CSX Transportation in Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Indiana. The line runs from Pittsburgh, west via Fort Wayne, Indiana, to Gary, Indiana, along what was once the Pennsylvania Railroad's Pittsburgh to Chicago main line.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">PRR MP54</span>

The Pennsylvania Railroad's MP54 was a class of electric multiple unit railcars. The class was initially constructed as an unpowered, locomotive hauled coach for suburban operations, but were designed to be rebuilt into self-propelled units as electrification plans were realized. The first of these self-propelled cars were placed in service with the PRR subsidiary Long Island Rail Road with DC propulsion in 1908 and soon spread to the Philadelphia-based network of low frequency AC electrified suburban lines in 1915. Eventually the cars came to be used throughout the railroad's electrified network from Washington, D.C. to New York City and Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Pennsylvania Railroad class G5</span> United States historic place

The Pennsylvania Railroad G5s was a class of 4-6-0 steam locomotives built by the PRR's Juniata Shops in the mid-late 1920s. It was designed for passenger trains, particularly on commuter lines, and became a fixture on suburban railroads until the mid-1950s. The G5s was the largest and most powerful 4-6-0 locomotive, except for a single Southern Pacific 4-6-0 that outweighed it by 5500 lb.

Commuter rail in Cleveland, Ohio, was operated by various companies until the discontinuance of the final route in early 1977. Since then, there have been several studies into the prospect of new commuter trains in the area, though none have progressed beyond the proposal phase.

The New York, Philadelphia and Norfolk Railroad was a railroad line that ran down the spine of the Delmarva Peninsula from Wilmington, Delaware to Cape Charles, Virginia and then by ferry to Norfolk, Virginia. It became part of the Pennsylvania Railroad system.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cleveland Line (Norfolk Southern)</span>

The Cleveland Line is a railroad line owned and operated by Norfolk Southern Railway (NS), in the U.S. states of Ohio and Pennsylvania. The line runs from Rochester, Pennsylvania to Cleveland, Ohio along a former Pennsylvania Railroad line.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Euclid Avenue station (Pennsylvania Railroad)</span> Former railroad station in Cleveland, Ohio, U.S.

Euclid Avenue, known after 1953 as Cleveland station, was a former railroad station at the corner of Euclid Avenue and East 55th Street in Cleveland. It was at the border of the Goodrich–Kirtland Park neighborhood to the north and the Central neighborhood to the south. Euclid Avenue station served as the terminus of the Pennsylvania Railroad line to Cleveland in its final years because of the closure and demolition of Cleveland Union Depot. The station was originally at ground level, but the tracks were later elevated over Euclid Avenue.

References

  1. "Pennsy Has New Cleveland Train". Pittsburgh Post-Gazette . December 7, 1948. Retrieved 2013-08-02.
  2. 1 2 "New Pennsy Train To Cleveland: 'Morning Steeler' Christening Monday". Pittsburgh Press . April 27, 1950. Retrieved 2013-08-02.
  3. "Pennsylvania Railroad". Official Guide of the Railways . National Railway Publication Co. March 1950.
  4. "PRR to End 'Steeler' Run". Pittsburgh Post-Gazette . July 16, 1957. Retrieved 2013-08-02.
  5. Pennsylvania Railroad (April 28, 1957). Pennsylvania Railroad Condensed Time Tables.
  6. Christopher T. Baer (December 2004). "PRR Chronology: 1958" (PDF). PRR Chronology. Retrieved 2013-08-02.
  7. "Commuter Schedules Last Run". Beaver Valley Times . July 23, 1958. Retrieved 2013-08-02.