Pittsburgh, Virginia and Charleston Railway

Pittsburgh, Virginia and Charleston Railway
Locale	Pittsburgh
Dates of operation	1872–1879
Successor	Pennsylvania Railroad
Track gauge	4 ft 8 1⁄2 in (1,435 mm) (standard gauge)
Length	30 miles

The Pittsburgh, Virginia and Charleston Railway was a predecessor of the Pennsylvania Railroad in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania. By 1905, when it was merged into the Pennsylvania, it owned a main line along the left (west) side of the Monongahela River, to Pittsburgh's South Side from West Brownsville. Branches connected to the South-West Pennsylvania Railway in Uniontown via Redstone Creek and to numerous coal mines.

History

The company was chartered by the Pennsylvania General Assembly as the Monongahela Valley Railroad in April 1867, with the right to construct a railroad connecting Pittsburgh to Waynesburg; it was renamed Pittsburgh, Virginia and Charleston Railway in February 1870. By November 1872, when the first segment opened from 4th Street in South Pittsburgh (now South Side Pittsburgh) to Homestead, the Pennsylvania had gained control. The primary purpose of this acquisition was to allow the Pennsylvania to construct a southern bypass around the congestion of Pittsburgh, via a short connection to the Main Line near Turtle Creek.^[1] The line was extended to Monongahela City in 1873,^[2] and in 1874 the company began operating a steamboat beyond to Brownsville. Trains began running into downtown Pittsburgh's Union Station in 1875, crossing the Monongahela on the Panhandle Bridge. The connection near Turtle Creek was completed in August 1878, with the opening of the Port Perry Branch and Port Perry Bridge. In 1879 the Pennsylvania began operating the PV&C under lease as its Monongahela Division.^[3]

The railroad was crossed by the O'Neil and Company Incline in West Elizabeth, Pennsylvania.^[4]

References

1. ^ Report of the Investigating Committee of the Pennsylvania Railroad Company, 1874, p. 207
2. ^ Pennsylvania Office of the Auditor General, Pennsylvania Bureau of Railways (1876) (digitized book). Annual Report of the Auditor General of the State of Pennsylvania and of the Tabulations and Deductions from the Reports of the Railroad, Canal, & Telegraph Companies for the Year 1874. Harrisburg, Pennsylvania: B.F. Meyers. pp. 589–595. http://books.google.com/books?id=LhwWAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA595&lpg=PA595&dq=%22H.B.+Hays%22+railroad&source=bl&ots=I9JXH2oEfj&sig=NPISRhkW3gNwTjwl3QcDk26zdLs&hl=en&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=9&ct=result#PPA589,M1. 
3. ^ Christopher T. Baer, PRR Chronology (Pennsylvania Railroad Technical and Historical Society), accessed November 2008
4. ^ "1876 Atlas of the Cities of Pittsburgh, Allegheny, and Adjoining Boroughs: Plate 26". http://images.library.pitt.edu/cgi-bin/maps/showmap.pl?client=maps&image=76v01p26&levels=5&originx=1674&originy=1279&lastlevel=1&fullheight=4698&fullwidth=3788&level=1&size=1&tnail.x=96&tnail.y=24.