Pennsylvania Transportation
The Delaware and Hudson Canal
The Delaware and Hudson Canal was the first venture
of the Delaware and Hudson Canal Company, which later
developed the Delaware and Hudson Railway. Between 1828 and 1899, its
barges carried anthracite coal from the mines
of Northeastern Pennsylvania to New York City via the Hudson River.
This affected both the city and the region,
stimulating the former's growth and encouraging settlement in the
latter, then sparsely populated. It remained
a profitable private operation for most of its existence, unlike other
canals of the era. Construction of the canal
involved some major feats of civil engineering, and led to the
development of some new technologies, particularly
in rail transport. - Wikipedia
Excavation For the Delaware and Hudson Canal/ Contract for 5 Miles of the Farmington Connecticut Canal
(Source: Republican Compiler (Gettysburg, Pennsylvania) September 21, 1825)
Canals
The excavation for the Delaware and Hudson Canal is stated to be going on with great briskness. Considerable progress has already been made. The seventeen miles put out in July last, will be completed in two or three weeks. It is calculated that if the same ardor is persevered in, with which the work was commenced, there can be no doubt but in two years from this fall, the union of the Delaware and Hudson will be effected.
We learn that contracts for constructing five miles of the Farmington (Connecticut) Canal were made on the 5th ult., and the considerable labor on each half mile section throughout this line. Further contracts have also been completed for another line of 16 miles, extending to a point about 3 miles above Farmington. The whole of the above contracts have been made with men of skill and respectability. A majority of them have had great experience in building the Erie Canal. It is now rendered certain that about $100,000 will be expended in actual labor of this canal this season. - Ib.
From the Pennsylvania Gazette
The Delaware and Hudson Canal commences at Kingston on the Hudson river
and runs over to the Delaware river through
the valley of the Neversink creek, thence up the valley of the Delaware
to the Lackawanen creek and up that creek
to the foot of the Railway. This is a continuous canal of 117 miles in
length and was completed from the Delaware
to the Hudson last autumn and it is expected the whole line will be
completed by July of this year, 1828.
The Railway commences at the termination of the canal and runs over
Moosick mountain to the caol mines on the Lackawannock
creek, in length 16? Miles, overcoming an elevation of 858 feet. Seven
locomotive steam engines will be employed
on three planes and five stationary engines and three brakes on the
ascents. The ascents, where the stationary
engines and brakes are used, are graded at 5 degrees. The railway and
all its appurtenances will be completed
in all 1828 at an estimated expense of $178,000. The cost of each
locomotive engine, about $1,600 and weighs about
six tons.
Delaware and Hudson Canal
(Source: Republican Compiler, Gettysburg, PA, January 7, 1829)
From the Albany Argus
The public seems scarcely aware that a Canal one hundred and
six miles in length, commencing at the tide water
near Kingston (NY), and terminating at Honesdale, in Pennsylvania, has
been completed since July, 1828; and that
this great work has been accomplished principally by the enterprise and
perseverance of an individual company.
As the channel for conveying coal to the navigable waters of the
Hudson, this canal must be regarded as an improvement
of incalculable importance to the public, if not of indispensable
necessity, in supplying the exhaustion of fuel
occasioned by the great increase of steam engines.
The first squadron of boats, loaded with coal, arrived at tide water on
the 5th. Fifty tons of this coal have been
consigned to the Messrs. Townsends, which will afford our citizens an
opportunity of testing its quality.
From gentlemen who have recently been through on the whole line of the
Canal, we learn that the work has been executed
in the most permanent manner and that in its construction, durability
and economy are judiciously combined. This
canal is 32 to 36 feet wide, upon the water line and has 4 feet depth
of water. The locks are 76 feet in length
between the gates and 9 feet wide. The boats are estimated to carry 25
to 30 tons.
From the mouth of the Rondout,
where it connects with the Hudson, to Port Jervis
(NY), near the Delaware River, is a distance of 59 miles; on this
section are 60 lift locks and one guard lock
of hammered stone, laid chiefly in hydraulic cement. There are also one
aqueduct over the Neversink river 224 feet
in length, upon stone piers and abutments; one over the Rondout
entirely of stone upon two arches, one of 60 and
the other of 50 feet chord; and ten others of various dimensions upon
stone piers and abutments, over lateral streams;
15 culverts of stone and 93 bridges having stone abutments and wing
walls.
Port Jervis is less than a mile from Carpenter's point, formed by the
junction of the Neversink
and Delaware rivers, and at which point, the States of New York and New
Jersey, corner upon Pennsylvania. Port
Jervis affords a view of the territory of three States and also of the
Delaware river and the fertile valley of
the Neversink.
From this point, the line of canal is carried along on the east side of
the Delaware to a point opposite the mouth
of the Lackawaxen River. At this place a dam has been erected across
the Delaware by means of which the canal is
fed and boats cross the river. From M'Carty's point, which is formed by
the junction of the Lackawaxen with the
Delaware, the canal follows up the valley of the Lackawaxen,25 miles,
to the forks of the Dyberry, at which point
the canal terminates, and where a thriving village is already
established called Honesdale.
On the Delaware section of 22 miles there are 13 wooden locks, and on
the Lackawaxen section of 25 miles are 37
locks of the same description. These locks are secured by a substantial
dry stone wall and so constructed that
the wooden lining can be taken out and replaced, without disturbing the
rest of the lock.
Honesdale, where the canal terminates, is 16 miles distant from the
coal region. Over this 16 miles, the coal is
to be transported upon a rail road, which is already in great
forwardness. The structure of the rail road is of
timber, with iron plates securely fastened to the timber rails with
screws. The plates are estimated to weigh nearly
260 tons. The railway is to be furnished with 5 stationary and 5
locomotive steam engines. It is estimated that
this rail road and its appendages will transport 540 tons per day, in
one direction. The steam engines for the
rail road were taken up as soon as the canal was navigable and it is
expected the rail road will be in operation
as early as June next. The rail road terminates at Carbondale, on the
Lackawanna river, where several hundred tons
of coal have already been quarried and transported to the canal by rail
road.
The coal of the Lackawanna has been tested and proves to be of the
first quality for working iron, as well as for
the ordinary purposes of fuel. As to quantity, there can be no
reasonable doubt on the subject. A visit to Carbondale,
and the coal region in its vicinity, will satisfy any person that the
supply is inexhaustible. And the canal being
now completed, and the rail road nearly finished, our citizens in the
cities and villages bordering upon the Hudson
may congratulate themselves upon the facilities offered by this great
highway for obtaining an inexhaustible supply
of fuel.
Rondout Creek
is a 63.3-mile-long (101.9 km) tributary of the Hudson River in
Ulster and Sullivan counties, New York, USA. It rises on Rocky Mountain
in the eastern Catskills, flows south into
Rondout Reservoir, part of New York City's water supply network, then
into the valley between the Catskills and
the Shawangunk Ridge, where it goes over the spectacular High Falls and
finally out to the Hudson at Kingston,
receiving along the way the Wallkill River.
The Neversink
River (also called Neversink Creek in its upper course) is
a 55-mile-long (89 km)[1] tributary of the Delaware River in
southeastern New York in the United States. The name
of the river comes from an Algonquian language phrase meaning "mad
river."