Bricks and Rails
© Ray Skwire
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Featured Photoist May 7th, 2010
There's always something interesting to see in this city. Recent street resurfacing on Spruce Street has uncovered not only large swaths of the underlying original brick road but also the original (possibly) subway-surface trolley lines, if not just surface lines that used to cover much of Philadelphia suburbs and the city.
If anyone could provide a cite-able date reference for when the roads were last created with bricks as well as when the trolley lines were initially covered up, that'd be great.
Update In trying to determine the age of these tracks, as late as this 1954 map (via www.phillytrolley.org/ ), east/west tracks were still present on Spruce Street as far as 60th to the west and Front St to the east.
In 1932, Spruce ran a continuous line from 60th, down and over the South St. Bridge to Front, back up Lombard, and returning back again over the South St. Bridge.
However, if you go farther back to 1923, starting from the western most turnaround @ 60th Street, it looks like the tracks came east on Spruce until 45th Street, then veered north to Chestnut, leaving an empty patch between 45th and 42nd.
So I'm guessing the line was changed sometime between '23 and '32, making the Route 42 one continuous line from 60th to Front via Spruce St., and removing the sidestep over to Chestnut. My guess was this was done to continue to offer a complete east/west trolley line available on Spruce alone and permitting more vehicular traffic to flow on Chestnut and Walnut where the trolleys only ran east on Chestnut and west on Walnut looping back around 9th St downtown??
That's without researching the history of the El, the automobile, and/or the impact of both on mass transit in Philadelphia.
Pay attention, kids! History can be fun!
Bricks and Rails
© Ray Skwire
[ Tumblr ] [ Twitter ] [ Facebook ]
Featured Photoist May 7th, 2010
There's always something interesting to see in this city. Recent street resurfacing on Spruce Street has uncovered not only large swaths of the underlying original brick road but also the original (possibly) subway-surface trolley lines, if not just surface lines that used to cover much of Philadelphia suburbs and the city.
If anyone could provide a cite-able date reference for when the roads were last created with bricks as well as when the trolley lines were initially covered up, that'd be great.
Update In trying to determine the age of these tracks, as late as this 1954 map (via www.phillytrolley.org/ ), east/west tracks were still present on Spruce Street as far as 60th to the west and Front St to the east.
In 1932, Spruce ran a continuous line from 60th, down and over the South St. Bridge to Front, back up Lombard, and returning back again over the South St. Bridge.
However, if you go farther back to 1923, starting from the western most turnaround @ 60th Street, it looks like the tracks came east on Spruce until 45th Street, then veered north to Chestnut, leaving an empty patch between 45th and 42nd.
So I'm guessing the line was changed sometime between '23 and '32, making the Route 42 one continuous line from 60th to Front via Spruce St., and removing the sidestep over to Chestnut. My guess was this was done to continue to offer a complete east/west trolley line available on Spruce alone and permitting more vehicular traffic to flow on Chestnut and Walnut where the trolleys only ran east on Chestnut and west on Walnut looping back around 9th St downtown??
That's without researching the history of the El, the automobile, and/or the impact of both on mass transit in Philadelphia.
Pay attention, kids! History can be fun!