The West Trenton Line is a

SEPTA Regional Rail The SEPTA Regional Rail system is a commuter rail network owned by the Southeastern Pennsylvania Transportation Authority and serving the Philadelphia Metropolitan area. The system has 13 branches and more than 150 active stations in Philadelp ...

service connecting

Center City Philadelphia Center City includes the central business district and central neighborhoods of Philadelphia. It comprises the area that made up the City of Philadelphia prior to the Act of Consolidation, 1854, which extended the city borders to be coterminous wi ...

to the West Trenton section of Ewing Township, New Jersey. With around 12,000 riders every weekday, it is the third busiest line in the SEPTA Regional Rail network.

Route

SEPTA West Trenton Line outbound train between Meadowbrook and Bethayres

The West Trenton Line connects

with the West Trenton section of Ewing, New Jersey. The line splits from the

SEPTA Main Line The SEPTA Main Line is the section of the SEPTA Regional Rail system from the Zoo Interlocking in West Philadelphia to Lansdale Station in Lansdale, Pennsylvania. The line is long, and serves all 13 SEPTA Regional Rail lines. Current servi ...

at Jenkintown, running northeast on the Neshaminy Line. At Bethayres, it crosses the Pennypack Trail that runs along the former Philadelphia, Newtown and New York Railroad, which once connected with the

Fox Chase Line The Fox Chase Line SEPTA Regional Rail service connecting Center City Philadelphia with Fox Chase. It uses the Fox Chase Branch, which branches off from the SEPTA Main Line at Newtown Junction north of the Wayne Junction station. It runs entirel ...

. At Oakford, the former New York Short Line Railroad, once part of the Reading's main line to West Trenton and Jersey City and currently CSX's Trenton Subdivision, merges. North of Oakford, the West Trenton Line runs parallel to CSX's Trenton Subdivision. The West Trenton Railroad Bridge, a concrete

arch bridge An arch bridge is a bridge with abutments at each end shaped as a curved arch. Arch bridges work by transferring the weight of the bridge and its loads partially into a horizontal thrust restrained by the abutments at either side. A viaduct ...

, crosses the Delaware River to the final stop at West Trenton.

History

Like all of the Reading Company's commuter lines, the West Trenton Line was

electrified Electrification is the process of powering by electricity and, in many contexts, the introduction of such power by changing over from an earlier power source. The broad meaning of the term, such as in the history of technology, economic history ...

in the early 1930s and has a mix of at-grade and grade separated crossings. Electrified service to West Trenton was opened on July 26, 1931. The RDG planned to also electrify tracks between West Trenton and the CNJ Terminal in Jersey City for long-distance service, but had to drop plans for electrification outside of the commuter service area due to economic setbacks as a result of the Great Depression. Reading Railroad Crusader streamliner

The line north of the split at Jenkintown was originally built as the

National Railway The National Railway or National Air Line Railroad was a planned railroad between New York City and Washington, D.C. in the United States around 1870. Part of it was eventually built from New York to Philadelphia by the Delaware and Bound Brook ...

project, opened on May 1, 1876, to provide an alternate to the

United New Jersey Railroad and Canal Companies The United New Jersey Railroad and Canal Company (UNJ&CC) was a railroad company which began as the important Camden & Amboy Railroad (C&A), whose 1830 lineage began as one of the eight or ten earliest permanent North AmericanList of Earliest Am ...

monopoly A monopoly (from Greek el, μόνος, mónos, single, alone, label=none and el, πωλεῖν, pōleîn, to sell, label=none), as described by Irving Fisher, is a market with the "absence of competition", creating a situation where a speci ...

over Philadelphia-

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the Un ...

travel. From Jenkintown to the Delaware River it was built by the

North Pennsylvania Railroad The North Pennsylvania Railroad was a railroad company which served Philadelphia, Montgomery County, Bucks County and Northampton County in Pennsylvania. It was formed in 1852 and began operation in 1855. The Philadelphia and Reading Railway, ...

as a branch, while the

New Jersey New Jersey is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Northeastern regions of the United States. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York; on the east, southeast, and south by the Atlantic Ocean; on the west by the Delaware ...

section was built by the Delaware and Bound Brook Railroad, merging with the

Central Railroad of New Jersey The Central Railroad of New Jersey, also known as the Jersey Central or Jersey Central Lines , was a Class I railroad with origins in the 1830s. It was absorbed into Conrail in April 1976 along with several other prominent bankrupt railroads of ...

at Bound Brook. In addition to the Reading Company, which leased the North Pennsylvania Railroad in 1879, the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad also used the line for passenger and freight service to New York City, including its famed ''Royal Blue'' service. In 1976 the Reading merged into Conrail, and in 1983 SEPTA took over operations.

Prior to 1981, limited service continued north to

Newark, New Jersey Newark ( , ) is the most populous city in the U.S. state of New Jersey and the seat of Essex County and the second largest city within the New York metropolitan area.Jersey City prior to the

Aldene Plan The Aldene Connection is a connection between two railroad lines in the Aldene neighborhood of Roselle Park, New Jersey, United States, one formerly belonging to the Central Railroad of New Jersey (CNJ), the other formerly of the Lehigh Valley R ...

of the 1960s), using Budd Company-built Diesel multiple units. This service was the last remains of the Reading's '' Crusader'' service, which began in 1937 using streamlined steam locomotives and passenger cars. SEPTA ended service beyond West Trenton on August 1, 1981; connecting NJT diesel service lasted until December 1982. NJT has since considered service resumption on their West Trenton Line. Beginning in 1984 the route was designated R1 West Trenton as part of SEPTA's diametrical reorganization of its lines. West Trenton Line trains operated through the city center to the Airport Line on the ex-Pennsylvania side of the system. In later years this behavior changed; the line was designated R3 West Trenton and trains continued on to the Media/Elwyn Line on weekdays and the Airport Line on weekends. The R-number naming system was dropped on July 25, 2010. , most West Trenton Line trains terminate at 30th Street Station on weekdays, while most evening trains operate to Malvern or Thorndale on the

Paoli/Thorndale Line The Paoli/Thorndale Line, or R5 commonly known as the Main Line, is a SEPTA Regional Rail service running from Center City Philadelphia through Montgomery County and Delaware County to Thorndale in Chester County. It operates along the far eas ...

. Most weekend trains operate to Chestnut Hill West on the Chestnut Hill West Line. On April 9, 2020, service on the line was suspended due to the

COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic, also known as the coronavirus pandemic, is an ongoing global pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The novel virus was first identi ...

, though stations between Center City and were still being served by other rail services. Service resumed on June 15, 2020.

Stations

The West Trenton Line includes the following stations north of the

Center City Commuter Connection 250px, The ASCE plaque in Jefferson Station 250px, City plaque in Jefferson Station The Center City Commuter Connection, (CCCC) commonly referred to as "the commuter tunnel", is a passenger railroad tunnel in Center City, Philadelphia, Penns ...

; stations indicated with a gray background are closed. The train expresses from Bethayres to Temple University inbound on some trains in the morning and expresses outbound from Temple University to Bethayres on some trains in the evening.

Ridership

Between FY 2008–FY 2019 yearly ridership on the West Trenton Line has held steady at 3.3–3.5 million, except for a dip to 3 million in FY 2018.

Notes

References

External links

SEPTA – West Trenton line
schedule (PDF)

{{Cheltenham SEPTA Regional Rail