Lackawanna Cut-Off

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Lackawanna Cut-Off
Lackawanna Main Line to Scranton 74.3 mi 119.6 km Slateford Junction Lackawanna Old Road Delaware River Viaduct PA NJ I-80 Susquehanna RR Lehigh and New England RR Route 94 Paulinskill Viaduct (Paulinskill) Paulinskill Valley Trail (LNE & NYSW) 64.8 mi 104.3 km Blairstown 60.7 mi 97.7 km Johnsonburg 57.6 mi 92.7 km Greendell Lehigh and Hudson River Railway Sussex Branch US 206 53.0 mi 85.3 km Andover Roseville Tunnel Musconetcong River Morris Canal Boonton Line to Hackettstown 45.7 mi 73.5 km Port Morris Junction 45.5 mi 73.2 km CR 631 Landing Masonry Bridge 45.5 mi 73.2 km Lake Hopatcong Morristown & Boonton Lines 0.0 mi 0 km Hoboken Terminal

The Lackawanna Cut-Off (New Jersey Cutoff or Hopatcong-Slateford Cutoff) is a former 28.45-mile (45.79 km) high-speed, double-track railway line in the USA which was constructed by the Delaware, Lackawanna and Western Railroad between 1908 and 1911. The Cut-Off runs west from Port Morris, New Jersey to Slateford, Pennsylvania.

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The Paulinskill Viaduct in Hainesburg, New Jersey, is 115 feet (35 m) tall and 1,100 feet (340 m) long, and was the largest reinforced concrete structure in the world when it was completed in 1910.

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The Lackawanna Cut-Off in Northwestern New Jersey

Considered an engineering masterpiece, the Cut-Off is a premier example of modern right-of-way construction, which minimizes grades, curves, and vehicular crossings. The Cut-Off pioneered the use of reinforced concrete on a grand scale, as well as the use of massive cutting and filling. Between 1908 and 1911 it was one of the largest construction projects in the world, and required moving massive amounts of fill using steam shovels similar to those that worked on the Panama Canal. Despite running through hills and across valleys, the Cut-Off never exceeds a gradient of 0.6%, with no curves having a speed limit of less than 70 mph (113 km/hr). In fact, trains were known to have reached speeds of up to 100 mph (161 km/hr) on certain sections of the Cut-Off. The DL&W's flagship Phoebe Snow passenger train ran over the Cut-Off to Buffalo, New York, in direct competition with the giant Pennsylvania Railroad and New York Central railroads.

The Lackawanna was one of the most profitable corporations in the country at the time, because it owned or controlled much of the anthracite production in the Scranton area, and thus had an unlimited supply of coal to power its own locomotives. Other profitable loads included dairy products, lumber, cement, fruit, and manufactured items from the growing Scranton area. At that time the Poconos was one of the most popular vacation destinations in the country, and several large hotels were located just a short distance from its Delaware Water Gap station. By the 50s, most of these profitable cargoes had disapperaed. Anthractie was no longer used by consumers, dairy and fruit products were haled by truck, and passenger service dried up as more people bought automobiles and took their vacations elsewhere. The Lackawanna aggressively pursued other cargoes, but the days of heavy traffic between New York and Scranton were over.

The DL&W merger with the Erie Railroad in 1960 led to a shift of most freight traffic off of the Cut-Off, and to the discontinuation of all passenger service in January 1970, although a change in management policy within the Erie Lackawanna Railroad (E-L) during the mid-1970s returned almost all E-L freight service back to the Cut-Off for several years. In 1973, the parallel Interstate 80 opened, adding insult to injury. By 1976, Conrail assumed seven bankrupt freight railroads in the Northeastern US, including the E-L. Conrail abandoned freight service on the Cut-off in early 1979, citing the severing of the high-speed Boonton Branch near Paterson, NJ during the early 1960s by the E-L as the primary reason for abandoning the entire Hoboken, NJ to Scranton route. Efforts by county officials in Northeastern Pennsylvania and Northwestern New Jersey during the early 1980s to prevent Conrail from removing the tracks from the Cut-Off delayed their inevitable removal in 1984. Afterwards, Conrail sold the right-of-way to two land developers. In 1994, the State of New Jersey, through the use of eminent domain, acquired the Cut-Off's right-of-way, which remains otherwise intact today. NJ Transit has begun work to relay track as far as Andover, NJ in what is the first phase in the reactivation of the Lackawanna Cut-Off.

Planning (1905-1908)

The original 75-foot (23 m) long survey map of the proposed Delaware Valley Cut-Off (as it was called in a handwritten note from September 25, 1906 on the back of the map) depicts the complete topographical layout of the 28.45-mile (45.79 km) right-of-way.

The Cut-Off was designed to bypass the DL&W's "Old Road," a circuitous route via Hackettstown, NJ and Washington, NJ, constructed on an alignment significantly south of where the Cut-Off would later be built, in anticipation of a potential merger with the Central Railroad of New Jersey (CNJ), which never took place. The Old Road was built to a clearance standard that was obsolete by the beginning of the 20th Century. As such, it had become an operational bottleneck, with Oxford Tunnel, which had been converted to gauntlet track (essentially a single track), being the biggest problem of all. President William Truesdale, who became president of the Lackawanna Railroad in 1899, foresaw the need for replacing the Old Road very early on, and the concept of the New Jersey Cut-Off was born.

Starting about 1905, more than a dozen potential routes between Port Morris, NJ and Slateford, PA were surveyed. Several of these routes would have required significantly more tunneling than already existed on the Old Road. (Interestingly, the Cut-Off as built was not amongst the originally surveyed alignments.) Given that any east-west route in northwest New Jersey would cross the north-south hills at a right angle, the need for tunnels on the new route seemed inevitable, in spite of the fact that one of the key reasons for building the new route was to eliminate the two tunnels on the old route.

As planning continued, a new route emerged. This route would have no tunnels and would cross the valley of the Pequest River on the world's largest railroad embankment: the Pequest Fill. Indeed, the "as built" version of the Cut-Off was not initially pursued because it was deemed impossible to build due to the projected scale of the fill that would be needed to cross the valley of the Pequest River.

The Cut-Off would run from the crest of the watershed at Lake Hopatcong (Port Morris, New Jersey) to Slateford, Pennsylvania on the Delaware River, two miles (3 km) south of the Delaware Water Gap. The line is 28.45 miles (45.79 km) in length, as compared to the Old Road's 39.6 miles (63.7 km), saving the Lackawanna 11.15 miles (17.94 km) between the two points. This, however, was but one element of the improvement, for it reduced the maximum grade of 1.1% to less than 0.6%. (A grade of exactly 1% is a rise or fall of 52.8 feet (16.1 m) per mile.) Although reducing the ruling grade by 0.5% (26 feet per mile) doesn't seem like much, the difference to railroad operations is significant.

The building of the Cut-Off also eliminated a total curvature of 1,560 degrees (over four complete circles) and did away with the two tunnels at Oxford, New Jersey and Manunka Chunk, although a new 1,024-foot (312 m) tunnel at Roseville would be required when construction of a cut there encountered unstable rock.

The Cut-Off cost $11 million to build and it has been estimated that it would cost approximately $1 billion to rebuild . Due to the initial cost, a new corporation, the Lackawanna Railroad of New Jersey (LRRNJ), had to be created in 1908 in order to finance the project. The LRRNJ remained a separate corporate entity until 1941, when it was merged into the Lackawanna Railroad. As a point of comparison, the 1909 valuation of the entire Lackawanna Railroad system was $75 million . It has been estimated that present-day restoration of service from Port Morris, NJ to Scranton, PA, 88 miles (142 km)—which would include replacement and/or upgrade of track (mostly single-track), stations, trainsets and restorative maintenance, but would not require any significant right-of-way construction—would cost about $550 million.

Construction (1908-1911)

One unintended consequence of the "borrow pits" was that, over time, several of them filled up with water to create ponds or a small lake in Byram Township, appropriately named Lake Lackawanna.

The Cut-Off required heavy cuts and fills totaling over 15 million cubic yards (11.8 million m³). Where it was impossible to obtain enough material from the cuts at either end of the fills, the Lackawanna Railroad was obliged to purchase outright some 760 acres (3.1 km²) of farmland for "borrow pits" (see photo on the right).

The earth and gravel was scooped out to a depth of twenty feet and hauled up onto the embankments, leaving in some places good-sized ponds where there was formerly level ground. Reinforced concrete served as the material for the construction of stations, signal towers, and the overhead highway crossings.

There were no street crossings on the Cut-Off when it was constructed. During the construction, a suspended aerial cableway was employed in making the fills. By aid of cables and towers, movable bridges capable of supporting dump cars were constructed and, when the work was in progress, presented the spectacle of a locomotive and train of cars suspended from a cable at an elevation of 100 feet (30 m) or more. At one time, ten steam shovels were at work on one fill alone. Five million pounds (2268 metric tonnes) of dynamite were consumed in rending apart the hills.

During construction, several foreign governments sent their representatives on tours of inspection to the Cut-Off, since it stood as the most notable example of modern railway construction from its inception.

Significant structures

The deepest cut on the Cut-Off, Roseville Cut (just west of the tunnel) is 130 feet (40 m) deep; the largest, Armstrong Cut (just west of Johnsonburg, and the site of a massive rockslide in 1942), is 100 feet (31 m) deep and one mile (1,600 m) long, mostly through solid rock. The largest of the fills, the Pequest Fill, crosses the Pequest River valley, extending westward from a point one mile (1.6 km) east of Andover, New Jersey. It is 110 feet (34 m) in height and over three miles (4.8 km) long and was the largest railroad fill in the world at the time of construction, with over 6.5 million cubic yards of fill needed to create a nearly level grade in this area.

The Delaware River Viaduct is 65 feet (22 m) tall and 1450 feet (446 m) long. In the adjacent photo, Interstate 80 passes under its arches on the opposite (New Jersey) side of the river and the Lackawanna's "Old Road" passes under it (behind the photographer) on the Pennsylvania side.

The Delaware River Viaduct as it appears from the Pennsylvania side of the river.

With five arches of 150 feet (46 m) span, the abutments of this bridge were excavated 61 feet (19 m) below the surface to bedrock to ensure their stability. There are a total of 73 concrete bridges and culverts on the Cut-off.

The Paulinskill Viaduct crosses over the Paulins Kill and was the largest reinforced concrete viaduct in the world at the time of its completion (see photo at top of page). The bridge is 115 feet (35.4 m) high (approximately the height of the Statue of Liberty from crown to foot) and has a total length of 1,100 feet (307 m). It is also called the Hainesburg Viaduct, after the nearby town of Hainesburg.

Three reinforced concrete interlocking towers were built on the line in 1911: Port Morris Junction (NJ), Greendell (NJ), and Slateford Junction (PA). Greendell Tower, about 12 miles (19 km) west of Port Morris, controlled the crossovers, long passing siding, and short freight siding there, and was manned only until 1938, when its operation was transferred to Port Morris Tower. Slateford Jct. Tower, which controlled the junction with the Old Road, remained in operation until January, 1951, when its operation was transferred to East Stroudsburg (PA) Tower, about six miles (10 km) west. Port Morris ("UN") Tower, which controlled the junction with the line to Washington, New Jersey, remained in operation until the end of freight operations on the Cut-Off in January 1979.

Operations (1911-1979)

The Lackawanna Limited nears Paulina, NJ in this 1912 photograph. Note the extra ballast that has been dropped.

The view from atop the Pequest Fill gave the passengers on the Cut-Off a sense of traveling on a high land bridge, with sweeping views across the valley of the Pequest.

Roseville Tunnel looking west. Note how the hill directly above the tunnel has been partially blasted away as part of the original aborted plan to create Roseville Cut, which, at 140 feet (43 m) deep, would have been the deepest cut on the Cut-Off. The instability of the native rock, however, dictated that a tunnel would be necessary instead.

The first revenue train crossed the Cut-Off during the early morning hours of Christmas Eve, 1911. It was the last major railroad line mainline to be built in New Jersey and is arguably the most scenic route in the state as it travels through the New Jersey Highlands, high above the surrounding terrain.

The opening of the Cut-Off had the immediate effect of downgrading the Old Road to secondary status. Long-distance trains, such as the Lackawanna Limited, which travelled from Hoboken, New Jersey to Buffalo, New York, and which provided sleeping car service on to Chicago and St. Louis, now called at Blairstown instead of Washington, New Jersey.

The Cut-Off was built for speed, as no curve on the line had a speed restriction of less than 70 mph (110 km/h). As a result of the superelevation of curves, the overall speed limit on the line was later raised to 80 mph (130 km/h). Although no official record exists of overspeed operations on the Cut-Off, "making up time" on the schedule when trains were late during the steam era is reported to have occurred, with speeds in excess of 100 mph (160 km/h) having been attained on occasion. Ironically, the coming of "modern" diesel operation during the 1940s and 50s restricted the top speeds of trains to 85 - 90 mph (140 km/h), depending on the type of locomotive.

At the outset, the Lackawanna's woman in white, Phoebe Snow, advertised the Cut-Off in posters that showed the Pequest Fill and proclaimed the Lackawanna as the "Shortest Route" [to Buffalo]. Later, when Phoebe Snow became a streamlined train, the Cut-Off, with its wide vistas from atop its immense fills, was considered a scenic highlight of the trip to Buffalo. Although few trains stopped at Johnsonburg or Greendell, except on flag, Blairstown was considered a major stop on the railroad and virtually all of the named passenger trains, Phoebe included, stopped there. (The station at Blairstown even sold commuter tickets.)

As it turned out, the Cut-Off in New Jersey was a testing ground for even greater engineering feats with the Pennsylvania Cut-Off (a.k.a. Summit-Hallstead Cutoff) — mostly notably the Tunkhannock Viaduct — in Pennsylvania. The Tunkhannock Viaduct was at the time it was built the largest reinforced concrete structure in the world and is the most enduring symbol of the Road of Anthracite. The Pennsylvania Cut-Off, which was built between 1912-1915, is still heavily used today and is owned by Canadian Pacific Railway.

Post World War II era (1946–1984)

After World War II, it became clear that coal was losing favor to other energy sources such as oil and natural gas, and its silk and other textile industries also shrank as jobs moved south or overseas. The railroad had also depended on milk and ice shipments for revenue; virtually every station had a creamery across the tracks. In contrast to other cities in the United States that prospered in the post-war "boom", the fortunes and population of Scranton (and the rest of Lackawanna and Luzerne Counties) began to diminish. Coal production and rail traffic declined rapidly throughout the 1950s. In 1955, some eastern and southern parts of the city were destroyed by floods from Hurricane Diane; 80 lives were lost in the area. The NYO&W Railroad, which depended heavily on its Scranton branch for freight traffic, was completely abandoned in 1957. The Knox Mine Disaster of January 1959 all but erased the mining industry in Northeastern Pennsylvania. The event terminated thousands of jobs as the waters of the Susquehanna River flooded the mines. There was hardly enough traffic to support one railroad, let alone three, and the New York, Susquehanna & Western quickly abandoned the route from Columbia to Sparta it had been sharing with the Lehigh & New England, which struggled on for another four years before folding in 1961. The newly-created Erie-Lackawanna managed to diversify its shipments from the growing Lehigh Valley enough to continue running freight over the Cutoff for another twenty years. Scranton had been the hub of its operations until the merger. Erie-Lackawanna procured a lucrative contract weith Chrysler to ship auto components from Mt. Pocono, and aggressively sought other contracts with suppliers in the area. The railroad also pioneered what came to be known as intermodal shipping. However, none of this was sufficient to compensate for the loss of revenue from coal shipments, and as labor costs and taxes rose, the railroad's financial position, while stronger than many other roads, weakened.

The Cut-off was single-tracked in 1958 in anticipation of the merger, and the management of the new company quickly moved most freight trains to the so-called "Erie side" from the "Lackawanna side", which meant that far fewer trains traveled over the Cut-Off. This traffic pattern remained in effect for over ten years, past the discontinuation of passenger service on January 6, 1970, but was changed during the early 1970s when virtually all EL traffic was moved back to the Lackawanna side. This continued through the Conrail merger in 1976. Conrail management, however, was displeased with the heavy grades on both sides of the Cut-off, and discontinued all service over the Cut-Off in January 1979 when this traffic was shifted over to non-EL lines.

With the Cut-Off out of service, all routine maintenance on the line was discontinued. Ironically, Conrail had replaced numerous crossties on the Cut-Off in 1976, so the line was in better shape than it had been in nearly 15 years. Typically, however, placing a line out of service was the first step towards abandonment. Nevertheless, as a last-ditch attempt, an Amtrak inspection train trundled over the line on November 13, 1979 in an attempt to elicit support for Hoboken-Scranton passenger service. But, with no funding, and insufficient political support available, the idea faded. This would be the last passenger train run on the Cut-Off during the 20th century. Today, however, New Jersey Transit plans to restore the route much like the 1979 plan.

Final years (1980 - 1984)

From 1980-84, various proposals were made in an attempt to purchase the line. Both Sussex and Morris counties in New Jersey and Monroe County in Pennsylvania, together with several private entrepreneurs, pursued funding to pay for the $6.5 million price-tag that Conrail had set for the line from Port Morris to Scranton (operating costs would be separate). Even CSX Transportation was purportedly involved at one point. In the end, the Monroe County Railroad Authority would block Conrail's complete removal of the track in Pennsylvania (only one track would be removed, including the short piece of the Cut-Off in Pennsylvania), but the entire trackage on the Cut-Off in New Jersey would soon be removed.

Abandonment and revival (1984 - present)

Slateford Junction, Pennsylvania, looking north to the Delaware Water Gap. The Cut-Off (left) and the Old Road (right) converge about 1,500 feet (460 m) past Slateford Tower (obscured by trees, left). A turntable was also located here.

The death-rattle of the Cut-Off would continue through the summer of 1984, with a Conrail rail train slowly but surely removing the tracks from west to east: the same direction in which they were originally laid. The final spike would be removed from the Lackawanna Cut-Off at Port Morris on October 24, 1984. Interestingly, the wooden ties and rock ballast were left in place, an unusual move for Conrail, which normally removed all components (rails, wooden ties, signals, poles, rock ballast) when dismantling an abandoned rail line.

In 1985, Conrail sold the trackless right-of-way for approximately $1 million to two land developers, one of whom, Gerard Turco of Kearny, New Jersey, proposed to use the Cut-Off as a massive source of construction fill, as well as to dump New York City garbage in the huge cuts. (The second developer, Burton Goldmeier, who purchased the short section of the line in Morris County, was rumored to want the right-of-way as an access road.) The Turco proposal, however, became a rallying point in preserving the Cut-Off and was a direct catalyst for a $40 million state bond issue for acquiring abandoned rail rights-of-way in New Jersey.

Port Morris ("UN") Tower has not seen a train pass in over a decade in this photo. The connection to NJ Transit's Montclair-Boonton Line to New York is a short distance past the tower.

The bond issue was approved by the voters in November 1989, and the New Jersey Department of Transportation subsequently initiated condemnation proceedings against the corporations that Mr. Turco and Mr. Goldmeier had set up in New Jersey for the Cut-Off. (Mr. Turco established separate corporations for the sections of right-of-way in each municipality that the Cut-Off ran through — Knowlton, Blairstown and Frelinghuysen townships in Warren County; Green, Byram, and Andover townships and Stanhope and Andover boroughs in Sussex County; and Roxbury Township in Morris County. In addition, a separate corporation had been set up for the Paulinskill Viaduct in New Jersey, near the bridge to Pennsylvania.)

Port Morris Junction and yard in this aerial shot clearly shows the Cut-Off (the straight line going towards the upper right (west)) and the NJ Transit line to Hackettstown.

In the late 1990s, the state of New Jersey and the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania purchased their respective portions of the Cut-Off for a total of $21 million. As of 2009, New Jersey Transit (NJT) is conducting studies to restore passenger service between Scranton, Pennsylvania, the Poconos, East Stroudsburg, Pennsylvania, western New Jersey, and Hoboken/New York City via its Morristown Line. However, this project has been delayed repeatedly due to financing issues and lukewarm support on the New Jersey side; yet, the project remains on NJT's list of System Expansion Projects during a recent shortening, when many other projects were removed from the list. It remains to be seen if Amtrak or a successor will plan to revive the Phoebe Snow or operate medium-haul trains from Binghamton, New York over a restored Cutoff.

Pennsylvania Senator Arlen Specter in this decade has advocated the restoration of passenger rail service between Scranton and Hoboken, and has secured federal funding for initial steps toward that restoration.

In late July, 2006, NJT informed interested parties that the final environmental review has been submitted to the Federal Transit Administration for approval and review. Assuming that the project is approved soon, funding for the project's construction can be expected to appear in the following fiscal year's budget.

In addition, the Lackawanna County and Monroe County Railroad Authorities merged in 2006 to form the Pennsylvania Northeast Regional Rail Authority, to help speed-up resumption of passenger service on the Pennsylvania side of the Lackawanna Cutoff project.

Officials in New York State have proposed high speed rail linking Scranton, Pennsylvania, to Potsdam, New York. Such a service would reach the New York cities of Binghamton, Syracuse, and Watertown. This could potentially mean high-speed direct, one-seat service from Potsdam to New York City through the Southern Tier of New York, much of which would be over former Lackawanna trackage which is still intact except for the Cutoff in New Jersey. In January 2008, New York Senator Charles Schumer announced that the New York Department of Transportation and Amtrak will study the possibility of restoring passenger service between Binghamton and Scranton.

In October 2006, developers pitched the idea of "Wall Street West": an office complex to serve as a backup for New York City firms in the event of another terrorist attack. The site is located near East Stroudsburg, Pennsylvania, which is located in a different watershed and power grid than New York City. It remains to be seen whether Wall Street West can help revive the Lackawanna Cutoff.

Cut-Off restoration

On June 4, 2008, the restoration of the Lackawanna Cut-Off took its first major step forward when the North Jersey Transportation Authority approved $36.6 million funding to rebuild the first 7.3 miles (11.7 km) of the Cut-Off between a new Andover Station and Port Morris Junction. The new track will be a single track and trains will run to the Andover Station from Port Morris Yard. The new station is proposed to initially be part of the Montclair-Boonton Line. While this is a small step in restoring the Cut-Off, this project is just a small technical step in securing the remaining $500-plus million in funding to restore a long overdue Scranton-Hoboken commuter service. Interestingly enough, the revival of the Lackawanna Cut-Off will take place nearly 100 years after it was first built. While no timetable for the new Andover Station or the rest of the line to Scranton has been set, officials have said that trains will be running to the new Andover Station within "a few years".

NJ Transit proposal

The North Jersey Transportation Planning Authority (NJTPA) has approved a proposal that would rebuild the Cut-Off in stages, commencing with the relaying of track between a connection with NJ Transit's Montclair-Boonton Line at Port Morris Junction (NJ) and Andover, NJ, a distance of 7.3 miles (11.7 km). The NJTPA's approval makes the project eligible for Federal Transit Administration (FTA) funding for engineering and design work.

The overall goal would be to rebuild the entire Cut-Off as a single-track 79 mph (127 km/h) railroad with passing sidings near Andover and Blairstown. The track will be laid so as to permit the addition of a second track in the future, if needed. Station sites, with additional parking, would be built at Andover (new station, with 125 parking spaces) and Blairstown (existing station, with 230 parking spaces). Stations will include high-level platforms and comply with Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) standards.

A NJ Transit train at Port Morris, New Jersey passes the area where the connecting switch to the Lackawanna Cut-Off would be rebuilt.

Midtown Direct service would operate from Andover east using dual-mode locomotives, currently under development. Stations in Pennsylvania include Delaware Water Gap (new station near the Delaware Water Gap Visitors' Center in Smithfield Township, with 900 parking spaces in a five-story parking garage); East Stroudsburg (new station site, slightly south of the existing station, with 228 parking spaces); Analomink (new station, near old station site, with 250 parking spaces); Pocono Mountain (new station, near the old Mount Pocono station, with 1,000 parking spaces); Tobyhanna (existing station, with 102 parking spaces); and Scranton (new station, west of existing station, with 30 parking spaces). Maintenance-of-way operations for the new line would work out of Greendell.

It is estimated that a total of $551 million in federal funds would be needed to entirely rebuild service to Scranton, Pennsylvania, a figure that includes the cost to acquire additional trainsets for this service. (The cost to rebuild to Andover is estimated to be $35 million.) Passenger service to Scranton, as currently proposed, would consist of 18 trains a day (nine eastbound and nine westbound) between Scranton and Hoboken (or New York City). By 2030, it is estimated that the service would carry 6,000 passengers a day from northeastern Pennsylvania and northwestern New Jersey to jobs in New Jersey and New York City.

Future commuters travelling to Hoboken using this service would board a Port Authority Trans-Hudson (PATH) train to travel into lower Manhattan or would switch to a Hudson-Bergen Light Rail train to points along the New Jersey side of the Hudson River. It is proposed that Midtown Direct service will be provided from Andover east, with additional service available from Dover, New Jersey east. A two-hour travel time from northeastern Pennsylvania to New York City has been estimated, which is comparable to the service available in New York's northern suburbs; rides into New York from Poughkeepsie, Brewster, and New Haven each take about two hours.

NJT will operate the service, which is estimated will cost about $26 million a year and would initially incur a $12 million deficit, which represents a cashbox return of approximately 60 cents on a dollar (NJ Transit's overall cashbox return on its operations is currently about 55 cents on the dollar).

Notes

The rural nature of the area through which the Cut-Off ran is evident in this 1912 photo (from a cracked glass plate negative) just west of the Paulinskill Viaduct. The two side-by-side tunnels in the photo are the never-to-be-used Lehigh & New England Railroad right-of-way and what is today's Route 94 in Knowlton Township, New Jersey.

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Old Road of the Lackawanna on the Pennsylvania side of the Delaware River Viaduct. Note how the tracks have been shifted to the center of the underpass to give greater overhead clearance, a common practice after a multi-tracked railroad line is reduced to single-track operation.

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The tunnel for the L&NE railway never saw a train, save for the dinky trains that built the tunnel. The tunnel for NJ Route 94 is on the left. Compare this photo with the one from 1912 (above), taken from atop a hill on the other side of the Cut-Off.

• The original Huntsville schoolhouse is buried under the Pequest Fill in Green Township. The DL&W paid for a second schoolhouse to be built a short distance away.
• The Lackawanna Cut-Off in New Jersey has been known by several different names: the Delaware Valley Cut-Off, the Hopatcong-Slateford Cut-Off, the New Jersey Cut-Off, the Stanhope-Slateford Cut-Off, the Blairstown Cut-Off, and the Lackawanna Cut-Off.
• About 20% of the Cut-Off was triple-tracked, with several miles having four tracks.
• As construction fell behind schedule during the summer of 1911, crews resorted to the use of torch light (there was no electricity available) to continue work around the clock.
• Old Lackawanna men reportedly referred to the blasted area above Roseville Tunnel as "rattlesnake territory".
• Although the Cut-Off is generally thought of as an all downgrade railroad east to west, there is a very short stretch of upgrade westbound (less than 0.1%) on the Pequest Fill east of Greendell. This accounts for the entire 11 feet (3.4 m) of "rise and fall" on the Cut-Off.
• The Cut-Off played an indirect role in the Rockport Wreck of June 16, 1925. The Rockport Wreck occurred when an eastbound passenger special bound for Hoboken derailed at Rockport Road, west of Hackettstown, New Jersey on the Old Road, killing 47 people. The passenger special had initially been scheduled to travel over the Cut-Off, but because of heavy freight traffic on the Cut-Off, and the fact that the train was hours ahead of the departure time for the transatlantic portion of the passengers' trip, it was routed over the Old Road. A storm earlier that evening had washed loose debris onto the grade crossing at Rockport (there had been road work up the hill from the grade crossing earlier that day), which caused the locomotive to derail and to end-up adjacent to one of the passenger cars with steam escaping, scalding numerous passengers to death. Although it is a prevailing legend that the tower at Slateford had made the decision to reroute the special, it was strictly a dispatcher's call. Had the special travelled over the Cut-Off, the Rockport Wreck would have never occurred.
• The right-of-way has been mostly impervious to wash-outs over the years. The Cut-Off has occasionally been beset by sink holes that formed from the settling of the underlying fill. This settling occurred for a time even after the line was opened to operations. The most recent sink holes, however, occurred just east of Roseville Tunnel during the early 1980s.
• The most notable runaway to have occurred on the Cut-off was in 1958, when a string of cement cars, with a caboose on the west end of the string, drifted away from Port Morris yard and started to drift westbound on the Cut-Off. A freight engine tried to catch the cars, but give up the chase shortly thereafter. The cars, which reportedly reached a speed of nearly 80 mph (130 km/h), wrecked at Point of Gap, nearly 30 miles (48 km) away. The caboose, which stayed on the track, would travel several more miles before finally coming to a stop. An eastbound local freight, which detected the westbound move by signal indications, took the siding at Greendell as fast as it could in an attempt to avoid the speeding runaway that was bearing down on them. Miraculously, the caboose on the front of the runaway string only clipped the markers on the back-end of the caboose on the eastbound freight.
• Four railroad lines crossed under the Cut-Off (none crossed over it): the DL&W's Sussex Branch, the Lehigh and Hudson River Railway, the New York, Susquehanna and Western Railway, and the Old Road of the Lackawanna. Of the four railroad lines, the Old Road crossing is the only one that still has tracks on it, although most of the Old Road in New Jersey has been abandoned since 1970.
• A fifth rail line was to have crossed under the Cut-Off, the Lehigh and New England Railroad (L&NE), which was planning its own right-of-way across northwestern New Jersey at the time of the Cut-Off's construction. The rail tunnel provided by the Lackawanna to protect the L&NE right-of-way still lies adjacent to the North side of NJ 94 near Columbia, NJ. The L&NE ultimately decided against building its own line and instead continued to exercise trackage rights over the New York, Susquehanna and Western Railroad's line between Hainesburg Junction and Swartswood Jct. As a result, the only trains to have operated through the L&NE's tunnel were the Cut-Off's dinky construction trains. While vestiges of the L&NE's never-used route (actually the grading and embankment built for the construction trains) can be found, the most endurable remnant is the tunnel, which now provides an access road under the Cut-Off to the recreational activities held at Tunnel Field in Knowlton Township.
• The opening of the Cut-Off decreased the distance on the DL&W Railroad's mainline between Hoboken, NJ and Buffalo, New York from 407 to 396 miles (637 km). As a result, in addition to the 28 new mile markers that were needed on the Cut-Off itself, all mile markers on the mainline west of the Cut-Off were replaced.

The Lehigh and Hudson River Railway (L&HR) crossed under the Cut-Off near Tranquility, New Jersey. One proposal during the mid-1980s would have created a connecting line for freights from the Cut-Off to the L&HR at this point, in order to bypass the heavily-travelled commuter lines east of this point.

• Easements owned by the Lackawanna Railroad for right-of-way about a mile south of Hope Township, New Jersey (about 5-6 miles south of the Cut-Off) were discovered in the 1950s. This would have been for one of the potential alignments for the Cut-Off.
• Shortly after the end of passenger service in 1970, the station at Blairstown Township was sold to a local radio station, which operated out of the building until the 1990s.
• Mr. Turco only became aware of the availability of the Cut-Off for purchase after he contacted Conrail regarding the acquisition of an adjacent parcel of land for the expansion of his nursing home complex in Andover, New Jersey. Conrail refused to allow Turco to buy an isolated parcel of the L&HR railway in Andover (a north-south right-of-way — also abandoned, although it still had tracks — that crossed under the Cut-Off at Tranquility a short distance from Turco's nursing home), causing Turco to buy the entire L&HR from Sparta Junction to Belvidere. Conrail reportedly offered Turco a "package deal" that included both rights-of-way.
• Presently, the right-of-way is unobstructed in New Jersey, although Slateford Road in Pennsylvania was temporarily filled in during the 1990s to replace an aging overhead bridge. Two road crossings have since been created on the cutoff – one just west of Port Morris, New Jersey in the 1980s and another at Greendell station in the 1990s.
• Lake Hopatcong station is located about 1,500 feet (460 m) east of Port Morris Junction, and technically was not on the Cut-Off. But, in anticipation of the opening of the new line, the station was completely rebuilt. The station building is on the top of the hill and still exists to this day. The Hopatcong Railroad to Bertrand Island also crossed behind the station. After Conrail took over operation of the railroad, in 1976, it declared the overhead pedestrian bridge here unsafe. Repeated attempts to dismantle the "unsafe" bridge were unsuccessful. In a somewhat comical ending, the bridge had to be finally brought down by dynamite. This station stop is still used by NJ Transit.
• The single-lane overhead bridge for County Route 521, just east of the Blairstown Station, was declared inadequate (although structurally sound) during the late 1980s. Recently, a second single-lane concrete bridge, based on the original DL&W design, was completed just east of the original bridge. Together, the two bridges now carry CR 521 over the Cut-Off right-of-way at that site.
• The Paulins Kill Viaduct became a popular spot for bungee jumpers until about the mid-1990s. The bridge has since been fenced off to discourage this.
• The Paulins Kill Viaduct has been featured in Weird NJ as being a purported site for Satanic cult rituals and sacrifices. Although the viaduct is somewhat remotely located]], it appears that much of the alleged Satanic connection is hyperbole.
• The line west of the Cut-off was to have been dismantled by Conrail, but the presence of the Tobyhanna Army Depot and the Chrysler facility at Mount Pocono helped to keep that part of the line in service between Scranton and Mount Pocono. The Commonwealth of Pennsylvania then stepped in and prevented any track from being removed. (In a somewhat bizarre footnote, the use of a privately-owned World War II tank was threatened at the time.) In 1996, Conrail operated the first train between Scranton and Slateford. Since then, freight service has been growing in the Poconos, with operator Delaware-Lackawanna Railroad handling freight on the line.
• Steamtown operates steam and/or diesel excursions from Scranton to destinations including Moscow, Tobyhanna and East Stroudsburg, with a rare June 28, 2008 trip to Delaware Water Gap Station: about 2 miles (3 km) north of Slateford Junction, PA.

Stations and landmarks

Lake Hopatcong station, a quarter-mile (0.4 km) east of Port Morris Jct. was expanded to four tracks in anticipation of the opening of the Cut-Off. With the Morris Canal immediately adjacent to the westbound station platform (out of photo, left) this was one of the most interesting stations on the entire Lackawanna system.

The proposed Andover station site, looking west onto the Pequest Fill.

Greendell lacked electricity when the station was opened; it became a flag stop and disappeared entirely from train schedules sometime after 1940.

Johnsonburg (station on right, creamery on left) was also a flag stop, but did occasionally see a train stop until 1970; the station reopened temporarily in 1942 as a command post following a massive landslide within Armstrong Cut (in distant background).

Blairstown. Commuter tickets were sold here until 1970, after which the building became a radio station for a number of years.

Milepost	Town	Station/Landmark	Notes
45.7	Roxbury Township	Port Morris Junction	Junction with NJT Morristown Line to Hoboken Terminal and Penn Station in Midtown Manhattan (via Midtown Direct service) – nearest station at Template:Njt-sta (MP 45.5). NJT's Port Morris rail yard is also located here.
53	Andover	Andover	Proposed NJT station - new station on Cut-Off. 65 parking spaces to be built. Possibly opening around 2012.
57.6	Green Township	Greendell	The station closed about 1934. Potential future maintenance-of-way facility on Cut-Off.
60.7	Frelinghuysen Township	Johnsonburg	The station closed in 1940, partially rebuilt during the early 1990s, and then demolished in 2007.
64.8	Blairstown Township	Blairstown	Proposed NJT station. This was the only regularly-scheduled stop on the Cut-Off.
71.6	Hainesburg (Knowlton Township)	Paulinskill Viaduct	No station
73	Stateline (NJ/PA)	Delaware River Viaduct	No station
74.3	Slateford	Slateford Junction	Junction with Old Road - No station
77.2	Delaware Water Gap	Template:Njt-sta	Proposed Park & Ride station. Station (about 1/2 mile east of the park & ride) was vacated in 1967.
81.6	East Stroudsburg	Template:Njt-sta	Proposed station
86.8	Analomink	Template:Njt-sta	Proposed station
100.3	Mount Pocono	Template:Njt-sta	Proposed station
107.6	Tobyhanna	Tobyhanna	Station closed January 1958. Proposed station.
133.1	Scranton	Template:Njt-sta	Proposed station (existing station building currently a Radisson Hotel).

(Note - Milepost refers to the number of miles from Hoboken, NJ.)

Sources

• The Delaware, Lackawanna & Western Railroad in the Nineteenth Century (1 volume) and the Delaware, Lackawanna & Western Railroad in the Twentieth Century (2 volumes) by Thomas Townsend Taber III, Lycoming Printing Company, 1977, 1980, 1981.
• The Lackawanna Railroad in Northwestern New Jersey by Larry Lowenthal and William T. Greenberg, Jr., Tri-State Railway Historical Society, Inc., 1987.
• Farewell to the Lackawanna Cut-Off (Parts I-IV), by Don Dorflinger, published in the Block Line, Tri-State Railway Historical Socirty, Inc., 1984-1985.
• Erie Lackawanna - Death of an American Railroad, 1938-1992, by H. Roger Grant, Stanford University Press, 1994.
• The Lackawanna Story - The First Hundred Years of the Delaware, Lackawanna and Western Railroad , by Robert J. Casey & W.A.S. Douglas, McGraw-Hill Book Company, 1951.
• Erie Lackawanna East, by Karl R. Zimmermann, Quadrant Press, Inc., 1975.
• The Route of Phoebe Snow - A Story of the Delaware, Lackawanna and Western Railroad, by Shelden S. King, Wilprint, Inc., 1986.
• The Lackawanna Cut-Off Right-of-Way Use and Extension Study (for the Counties of Morris, Sussex and Warren), Gannett Fleming and Kaiser Engineers, Corp., September 1989.

See also

• Steamtown National Historic Site
• William Truesdale

External links

• The Great Lackawanna Cutoff - Then & Now
• DL&W Booklet - The Story of the New Jersey Cutoff
• Touring the Lackawanna Cutoff
• The Penn Jersey Rail Coalition
• Delaware, Lackawanna and Western Railroad Historical Society