A visit to the Abandoned Pennsylvania Turnpike

A visit to the Abandoned Pennsylvania Turnpike - October 2004

In October 2004, Pennsylvania Highways webmaster and friend of the blog, Jeff Kitsko, hosted a road meet centered on the abandoned Pennsylvania Turnpike in Breezewood. I was fortunate to attend. What is unique about this trip to the abandoned highway is that we actually were able to drive on the old turnpike 36 years after it was bypassed. We also were able to walk into the offices and ventilation areas of the tunnels for a unique perspective of the old highway. Co-blogger Doug Kerr also was at the meet and some of his photos are included below.

From the start of our trip in Breezewood and looking back towards the Breezewood Interchange and the start of the abandoned Turnpike. (Doug Kerr)

Entrance to the western portal of Ray's Hill Tunnel. At a length of only 2,532 feet, only one set of exhaust fans - at the eastern portal - was needed.

After exiting the tunnel, autumn traveling motorists journeyed through a chute of color towards the Sideling Hill Tunnel, then the longest in the system.

Near the western portal of Sideling Hill is this stone culvert built for the South Penn Railroad.

A look inside the Sideling Hill Tunnel. You can see why many bikers and walkers decide to turn around and not make it to the other side. (Doug Kerr)

A view from the upstairs offices located inside the western portal of the Sideling Hill Tunnel. The cars give a great demonstration of how two lanes of Turnpike traffic would merge into one entering the tunnel.

Inside the Sideling Hill Tunnel and doorway leading to upstairs. (Doug Kerr)

Graffiti is rampant inside the tunnel. (Doug Kerr)

Looking back towards the eastern portal of Sideling Hill Tunnel, which is over 6700 feet long!

A look at the abandoned pike from near the site of the former Cove Valley Travel Plaza.

Site Navigation:

Return to Pennsylvania Turnpike Collection Index

Sources & Links:

Doug Kerr
Abandoned Pennsylvania Turnpike ----Brian Troutman

Comments

Warren Taylor said…

I'm also visiting this site regularly, this web site is really nice and the users are genuinely sharing good thoughts.

2:24 AM

Paper Highways: The Unbuilt New Orleans Bypass (Proposed I-410)

There are many examples around the United States of proposed freeway corridors in urban areas that never saw the light of day for one reason or another. They all fall somewhere in between the little-known and the infamous and from the mundane to the spectacular. One of the more obscure and interesting examples of such a project is the short-lived idea to construct a southern beltway for the New Orleans metropolitan area in the 1960s and 70s. Greater New Orleans and its surrounding area grew rapidly in the years after World War II, as suburban sprawl encroached on the historically rural downriver parishes around the city. In response to the development of the region’s Westbank and the emergence of communities in St. Charles and St. John the Baptist Parishes as viable suburban communities during this period, regional planners began to consider concepts for new infrastructure projects to serve this growing population. The idea for a circular freeway around the southern perimeter of t

Hernando de Soto Bridge (Memphis, TN)

The newest of the bridges that span the lower Mississippi River at Memphis, the Hernando de Soto Bridge was completed in 1973 and carries Interstate 40 between downtown Memphis and West Memphis, AR. The bridge’s signature M-shaped superstructure makes it an instantly recognizable landmark in the city and one of the most visually unique bridges on the Mississippi River. As early as 1953, Memphis city planners recommended the construction of a second highway bridge across the Mississippi River to connect the city with West Memphis, AR. The Memphis & Arkansas Bridge had been completed only four years earlier a couple miles downriver from downtown, however it was expected that long-term growth in the metro area would warrant the construction of an additional bridge, the fourth crossing of the Mississippi River to be built at Memphis, in the not-too-distant future. Unlike the previous three Mississippi River bridges to be built the city, the location chosen for this bridge was about two

Memphis & Arkansas Bridge (Memphis, TN)

Like the expansion of the railroads the previous century, the modernization of the country’s highway infrastructure in the early and mid 20th Century required the construction of new landmark bridges along the lower Mississippi River (and nation-wide for that matter) that would facilitate the expected growth in overall traffic demand in ensuing decades. While this new movement had been anticipated to some extent in the Memphis area with the design of the Harahan Bridge, neither it nor its neighbor the older Frisco Bridge were capable of accommodating the sharp rise in the popularity and demand of the automobile as a mode of cross-river transportation during the Great Depression. As was the case 30 years prior, the solution in the 1940s was to construct a new bridge in the same general location as its predecessors, only this time the bridge would be the first built exclusively for vehicle traffic. This bridge, the Memphis & Arkansas Bridge, was completed in 1949 and was the third

Gribblenation

Search This Blog