The Patterson Creek Cutoff is an abandoned

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 built by the

Baltimore and Ohio Railroad The Baltimore and Ohio Railroad was the first common carrier railroad and the oldest railroad in the United States, with its first section opening in 1830. Merchants from Baltimore, which had benefited to some extent from the construction of ...

(B&O) in northern

West Virginia West Virginia is a state in the Appalachian, Mid-Atlantic and Southeastern regions of the United States.The Census Bureau and the Association of American Geographers classify West Virginia as part of the Southern United States while the Bur ...

and Western

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 ...

, that served trains running on the B&O "West End" line in the

Cumberland, Maryland Cumberland is a U.S. city in and the county seat of Allegany County, 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 s ...

area. The cutoff route ran from

McKenzie, Maryland McKenzie is an unincorporated community in Allegany County, Maryland, United States, containing only a few houses, and mostly land. Its name is derived from a family which owned a large farm along the river bottom in the area. It is located direc ...

Patterson Creek, West Virginia Patterson Creek is an unincorporated community in Mineral County, West Virginia, United States. It lies at the northeastern end of the county, and is named for Patterson Creek, which empties into the North Branch Potomac River The North Branch ...

, providing a bypass of the B&O

rail yard A rail yard, railway yard, railroad yard (US) or simply yard, is a series of tracks in a rail network for storing, sorting, or loading and unloading rail vehicles and locomotives. Yards have many tracks in parallel for keeping rolling stock or u ...

in Cumberland for coal trains moving between

Keyser, West Virginia Keyser () is a city in and the county seat of Mineral County, West Virginia. It is part of the Cumberland, MD-WV Metropolitan Statistical Area. The population was 4,853 at the 2020 census. History Keyser, the county seat of Mineral County, is ...

and

Brunswick, Maryland Brunswick is a city in southwestern Frederick County, Maryland, United States. The city is located on the north bank of the Potomac River; Loudoun County, Virginia occupies the opposite shore. The population of Brunswick was 7,762 at the 2020 ce ...

. The B&O opened the

double track A double-track railway usually involves running one track in each direction, compared to a single-track railway where trains in both directions share the same track. Overview In the earliest days of railways in the United Kingdom, most lin ...

line in 1904, and it included a tunnel and a bridge, both of which are still in existence. The tunnel passes through

Knobly Mountain Knobly Mountain is a ridge and part of the Ridge-and-Valley Appalachians, located east of New Creek Mountain in Mineral and Grant counties, West Virginia, in the United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known a ...

and is slightly less than in length. The cutoff was later reduced to

single track Single may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media * Single (music), a song release Songs * "Single" (Natasha Bedingfield song), 2004 * "Single" (New Kids on the Block and Ne-Yo song), 2008 * "Single" (William Wei song), 2016 * "Single", by ...

, and ultimately abandoned in the early 1970s by 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 und ...

, successor to the B&O. The rails have been removed from the bridge structure, and a few

railroad tie A railroad tie, crosstie (American English), railway tie (Canadian English) or railway sleeper (Australian and British English) is a rectangular support for the rails in railroad tracks. Generally laid perpendicular to the rails, ties transfer ...

s are in an advanced state of decomposition. The line's

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 ...

can still be easily distinguished, especially in McKenzie, where there is a large

cut and fill In earthmoving, cut and fill is the process of constructing a railway, road or canal whereby the amount of material from cuts roughly matches the amount of fill needed to make nearby embankments to minimize the amount of construction labor. ...

CSX Transportation CSX Transportation , known colloquially as simply CSX, is a Class I freight railroad operating in the Eastern United States and the Canadian provinces of Ontario and Quebec. The railroad operates approximately 21,000 route miles () of track. ...

, the successor to the Chessie System, continues to operate the main rail line in the McKenzie area as the Mountain Subdivision, and the Cumberland Subdivision in the Patterson Creek area.

References

"Mountain Subdivision: Eastern Approach."
''Northern West Virginia's Railroads.'' Accessed 2010-08-11. * mtnsub.org

''Railfanning the B&O Around Cumberland, MD.'' Accessed 2010-08-11. {{Refend Baltimore and Ohio Railroad lines Rail infrastructure in Maryland Rail infrastructure in West Virginia Railroad cutoffs 1904 establishments in Maryland 1904 establishments in West Virginia Closed railway lines in the United States