The Monongahela Connecting Railroad or Mon Conn is a small industrial

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 ...

Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania Pittsburgh ( ) is a city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, United States, and the county seat of Allegheny County. It is the most populous city in both Allegheny County and Western Pennsylvania, the second-most populous city in Pennsylva ...

. It was a subsidiary of the

Jones & Laughlin Steel Company The Jones and Laughlin Steel Corporation began as the American Iron Company, founded in 1852 by Bernard Lauth and Benjamin Franklin Jones, a few miles (c 4 km) south of Pittsburgh along the Monongahela River. Lauth's interest was bought in ...

and a large portion of its work was for its parent company, though it also serves other industries along the line. The railroad is possibly best known for its

Hot Metal Bridge The Hot Metal Bridge is a truss bridge in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, that crosses the Monongahela River. The bridge consists of two parallel spans on a single set of piers: the former Monongahela Connecting Railroad Bridge, built in 1887, on the u ...

, which was used to carry molten iron across the

Monongahela River The Monongahela River ( , )—often referred to locally as the Mon ()—is a U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline dataThe National Map accessed August 15, 2011 river on the Allegheny Plateau in north-cen ...

from J&L's Eliza Furnaces to the

Bessemer converter The Bessemer process was the first inexpensive industrial process for the mass production of steel from molten pig iron before the development of the open hearth furnace. The key principle is removal of impurities from the iron by oxidation w ...

s (later, open hearth furnaces) and rolling mills at J&L's South Side facility. The railroad was also a

dieselization Dieselisation (US: dieselization) is the process of equipping vehicles with a diesel engine or diesel engines. It can involve replacing an internal combustion engine powered by petrol (gasoline) fuel with an engine powered by diesel fuel, as o ...

pioneer, buying many early diesel locomotives from

Alco The American Locomotive Company (often shortened to ALCO, ALCo or Alco) was an American manufacturer of locomotives, diesel generators, steel, and tanks that operated from 1901 to 1969. The company was formed by the merger of seven smaller locomo ...

General Electric General Electric Company (GE) is an American multinational conglomerate founded in 1892, and incorporated in New York state and headquartered in Boston. The company operated in sectors including healthcare, aviation, power, renewable en ...

and other manufacturers. The railroad is still in existence, but in much reduced form. The Monongahela River bridge has been converted to a two-lane automobile bridge, with the adjacent hot metal bridge converted for bicycles. The bridges are collectively called the

. The railroad serves a few small industrial customers along the north/east (right downstream) bank of the river. Joseph L. Sorensen was Vice President of the Monongahela Connecting Railroad from 1948 until 1952.

External links

Photos of the present-day Mon Conn
{{DEFAULTSORT:Monongahela Connecting Railroad Defunct Pennsylvania railroads Switching and terminal railroads History of Allegheny County, Pennsylvania Transportation in Pittsburgh

See also

External links