The Deer Creek Tunnel is an incomplete and abandoned double-track railroad tunnel through the Walnut Hills in Cincinnati, Ohio, United States. Construction was begun in the 1850s by the

broad gauge A broad-gauge railway is a railway with a track gauge (the distance between the rails) broader than the used by standard-gauge railways. Broad gauge of , commonly known as Russian gauge, is the dominant track gauge in former Soviet Union (CIS ...

Dayton and Cincinnati Railroad, but ceased in 1855 due to lack of funds, and was never restarted. The Dayton and Cincinnati Railroad was incorporated in February 1847 as the Dayton, Lebanon and Deerfield Railroad, and renamed Dayton, Springboro, Lebanon and Cincinnati Railroad in February 1848, Dayton and Cincinnati Railroad in February 1849, and Cincinnati Railway Tunnel Company in January 1872. The

Cincinnati, Lebanon and Northern Railway The Cincinnati, Lebanon and Northern Railway (CL&N) was a local passenger and freight-carrying railroad in the southwestern part of the U.S. state of Ohio, connecting Cincinnati to Dayton via Lebanon. It was built in the late 19th century to give ...

, a

Pennsylvania Railroad The Pennsylvania Railroad (reporting mark PRR), legal name The Pennsylvania Railroad Company also known as the "Pennsy", was an American Class I railroad that was established in 1846 and headquartered in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It was named ...

subsidiary which itself had the much shorter

Oak Street Tunnel An oak is a tree or shrub in the genus ''Quercus'' (; Latin "oak tree") of the beech family, Fagaceae. There are approximately 500 extant species of oaks. The common name "oak" also appears in the names of species in related genera, notably ''L ...

in the same area, acquired the unfinished tunnel in September 1902 after a

foreclosure Foreclosure is a legal process in which a lender attempts to recover the balance of a loan from a borrower who has stopped making payments to the lender by forcing the sale of the asset used as the collateral for the loan. Formally, a mortg ...

sale in May 1896. Ownership passed to the

Pennsylvania, Ohio and Detroit Railroad The Pennsylvania, Ohio and Detroit Railroad was a railroad company in the U.S. states of Ohio and Michigan that existed from 1926 to 1956. Its sole purpose was to simplify the corporate structure of the Pennsylvania Railroad by merging subsidiaries ...

in January 1926 and the Connecting Railway in May 1956, and remained with the

Penn Central Company The Penn Central Transportation Company, commonly abbreviated to Penn Central, was an American class I railroad that operated from 1968 to 1976. Penn Central combined three traditional corporate rivals (the Pennsylvania, New York Central and the ...

when

Conrail Conrail , formally the Consolidated Rail Corporation, was the primary Class I railroad in the Northeastern United States between 1976 and 1999. The trade name Conrail is a portmanteau based on the company's legal name. It continues to do busin ...

took over that company's profitable rail assets in 1976.

Deer Creek

Deer Creek was a stream adjacent to the tunnel project in the valley between Mount Auburn and

Eden Park Eden Park is New Zealand's largest sports stadium, with a capacity of 50,000. Located in central Auckland, New Zealand's largest city, it is three kilometres southwest of the CBD, on the boundary between the suburbs of Mount Eden and King ...

. By 1904, it had been covered by streets and converted into a sewer.

References

External links

Cincinnati-Transit.net: Deer Creek RR Tunnel
Railroad tunnels in Ohio Pennsylvania Railroad tunnels Proposed tunnels in the United States Rail transportation in Cincinnati Cancelled railway tunnels 1849 establishments in Ohio Cancelled projects in the United States Transportation buildings and structures in Cincinnati {{Ohio-transport-stub