The Capital Subdivision is a

railroad Rail transport (also known as train transport) is a means of transport that transfers passengers and goods on wheeled vehicles running on rails, which are incorporated in tracks. In contrast to road transport, where the vehicles run on a pre ...

line owned and operated by CSX Transportation in the

U.S. state In the United States, a state is a constituent political entity, of which there are 50. Bound together in a political union, each state holds governmental jurisdiction over a separate and defined geographic territory where it shares its sove ...

Maryland Maryland ( ) is a state in the Mid-Atlantic region of the United States. It shares borders with Virginia, West Virginia, and the District of Columbia to its south and west; Pennsylvania to its north; and Delaware and the Atlantic Ocean to ...

and the

District of Columbia ) , image_skyline = , image_caption = Clockwise from top left: the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall, United States Capitol, Logan Circle, Jefferson Memorial, White House, Adams Morgan, ...

. The line runs from near

Baltimore, Maryland Baltimore ( , locally: or ) is the List of municipalities in Maryland, most populous city in the U.S. state of Maryland, fourth most populous city in the Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic, and List of United States cities by popula ...

, southwest to

Washington, D.C. ) , image_skyline = , image_caption = Clockwise from top left: the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall, United States Capitol, Logan Circle, Jefferson Memorial, White House, Adams Morgan, ...

, along the former Baltimore and Ohio Rail Road (B&O) Washington Branch. The subdivision's Alexandria Extension provides a connection to

Virginia Virginia, officially the Commonwealth of Virginia, is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Southeastern regions of the United States, between the Atlantic Coast and the Appalachian Mountains. The geography and climate of the Commonwealth ar ...

and points south.

Route description

The northeast end of the line is at Halethorpe, Maryland, just north of the historic

Thomas Viaduct The Thomas Viaduct spans the Patapsco River and Patapsco Valley between Relay, Maryland and Elkridge, Maryland, USA. It was commissioned by the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad (B&O); built between July 4, 1833, and July 4, 1835; and named for Philip ...

, where it meets the

Baltimore Terminal Subdivision The Baltimore Terminal Subdivision is a railroad line owned and operated by CSX Transportation in the U.S. state of Maryland. The line runs from Baltimore to Halethorpe along the original Baltimore and Ohio Railroad (B&O) line, one of the old ...

and the

Old Main Line Subdivision The Old Main Line Subdivision is a railroad line owned and operated by CSX Transportation in the U.S. state of Maryland. The line runs from Relay (outside Baltimore) west to Point of Rocks, and was once the main line of the Baltimore and Ohio Ra ...

. Its southwest end is at the

yard The yard (symbol: yd) is an English unit of length in both the British imperial and US customary systems of measurement equalling 3 feet or 36 inches. Since 1959 it has been by international agreement standardized as exactly ...

north of

Union Station A union station (also known as a union terminal, a joint station in Europe, and a joint-use station in Japan) is a railway station at which the tracks and facilities are shared by two or more separate railway companies, allowing passengers to ...

, at a junction with the

Metropolitan Subdivision The Metropolitan Subdivision is a railroad line owned and operated by CSX Transportation in the District of Columbia and the U.S. state of Maryland. The 79-mile line runs from Washington, D.C., northwest to Weverton, Maryland, along the form ...

and

Amtrak The National Railroad Passenger Corporation, doing business as Amtrak () , is the national passenger railroad company of the United States. It operates inter-city rail service in 46 of the 48 contiguous U.S. States and nine cities in Canada ...

's Northeast Corridor. Between Elkridge and Laurel, the Capital Subdivision's rail alignment forms the border between Howard and

Anne Arundel Anne Calvert, Baroness Baltimore (née Hon. Anne Arundell; c. 1615/1616G.E. Cokayne; with Vicary Gibbs, H.A. Doubleday, Geoffrey H. White, Duncan Warrand and Lord Howard de Walden, editors, The Complete Peerage of England, Scotland, Ireland, G ...

counties, having been built before Howard County was created from western Anne Arundel County in 1844.

MARC Train MARC (Maryland Area Rail Commuter) is a commuter rail system in the Baltimore–Washington metropolitan area. MARC is administered by the Maryland Transit Administration (MTA) and operated under contract by Alstom and Amtrak on track owned b ...

's Camden Line, descended from B&O commuter service between Baltimore and Washington, operates over the entire length of the main line.

History

In 1831 the

Maryland General Assembly The Maryland General Assembly is the state legislature of the U.S. state of Maryland that convenes within the State House in Annapolis. It is a bicameral body: the upper chamber, the Maryland Senate, has 47 representatives and the lower chamber ...

authorized the B&O to build a branch from their main line within 8 miles (13 km) of Baltimore, to Washington. As this line would take much business from the parallel turnpikes, especially the

Washington and Baltimore Turnpike U.S. Route 1 (US 1) is the easternmost and longest of the major north–south routes of the older 1920s era United States Numbered Highway System, running from Key West, Florida to Fort Kent, Maine. In the U.S. state of Maryland, it r ...

, the charter specifically allowed those companies to subscribe to the stock of the railroad. Construction began in July 1833, and the line opened on August 25, 1835, splitting from the B&O main line at

Relay A relay Electromechanical relay schematic showing a control coil, four pairs of normally open and one pair of normally closed contacts An automotive-style miniature relay with the dust cover taken off A relay is an electrically operated switch ...

, roughly 7 miles (11 km) from Baltimore. Notable structural features on the original line include the

, the first multi-span

masonry Masonry is the building of structures from individual units, which are often laid in and bound together by mortar; the term ''masonry'' can also refer to the units themselves. The common materials of masonry construction are bricks, building ...

railroad bridge in the United States, and the largest bridge in the country when it was completed in 1835; and the earliest example of an

iron Iron () is a chemical element with Symbol (chemistry), symbol Fe (from la, Wikt:ferrum, ferrum) and atomic number 26. It is a metal that belongs to the first transition series and group 8 element, group 8 of the periodic table. It is, Abundanc ...

truss bridge A truss bridge is a bridge whose load-bearing superstructure is composed of a truss, a structure of connected elements, usually forming triangular units. The connected elements (typically straight) may be stressed from tension, compression, or ...

Washington depots

Union Station from Columbus Circle, Washington, D

The first B&O

passenger station A train station, railway station, railroad station or depot is a railway facility where trains stop to load or unload passengers, freight or both. It generally consists of at least one platform, one track and a station building providing such ...

(1835–1851) was located west of the

Capitol A capitol, named after the Capitoline Hill in Rome, is usually a legislative building where a legislature meets and makes laws for its respective political entity. Specific capitols include: * United States Capitol in Washington, D.C. * Numerous ...

, at 2nd Street and Pennsylvania Avenue NW. In 1851 the New Jersey Avenue Station was built at a point slightly north of the Capitol, on New Jersey Avenue NW, in the area now called Union Station Plaza. Trains reached that location via the current location of West Virginia Avenue, street-running trackage on I Street NE and Delaware Avenue, and private

right-of-way Right of way is the legal right, established by grant from a landowner or long usage (i.e. by prescription), to pass along a specific route through property belonging to another. A similar ''right of access'' also exists on land held by a gov ...

just south of the current location of Louisiana Avenue. When the Washington Terminal Company opened the new

in 1907, that alignment was changed to the current routing, partially using the former location of Delaware Avenue.

Acquisition

The Chesapeake and Ohio Railway acquired control of the B&O in 1962, and the B&O and C&O both became a subsidiaries of the

Chessie System Chessie System, Inc. was a holding company that owned the Chesapeake and Ohio Railway (C&O), the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad (B&O), the Western Maryland Railway (WM), and Baltimore and Ohio Chicago Terminal Railroad (B&OCT). Trains operated unde ...

in 1973. In 1980 the Chessie System merged with the Seaboard System to form

CSX Corporation CSX Corporation is an American holding company focused on rail transportation and real estate in North America, among other industries. The company was established in 1980 as part of the Chessie System and Seaboard Coast Line Industries merger. ...

. In 1987 the CSX Corporation merged the B&O into the C&O, then, later that same year, merged the C&O into CSX Transportation (CSXT), which now owns the line.

References

External links