"The Catonsville Short Line"
All photos by Adam Paul
The term "overgrown" only begins to describe the current state of the old Catonsville Branch of the Pennsylvania Railroad. In the vicinity of Maiden Choice Lane, this was the best shot possible, considering the dense growth.
Call it "The Little Line that couldn't!" The Pennsy's Catonsville Branch, in all its incarnations, was an odd little truncation off the busy Northeast Mainline that deleved into the woods and took a hilly, curving route before finally winding up just West of the heart of Historic Catonsville.Interestingly, the Catonsville Branch is quite a bit different from many of the other "ghostly" railroads of the area. Unlike the Northern Central, Ma & Pa, and even the Greenspring Branch, which were built with the intention of operating a sufficient long distance trunk service, the loopy Catonsville Branch just branched off a mainine, and seemed to meander about curve after curve before finally coming to rest atop the quaint hilltop suburb of Catonsville, with no seeming intention of travelling any further, and no logical place to proceed from there.
Very little is written about the Catonsville Branch, making a timeline difficult. The line apparently dates to about the 1870's, formed as the Caton and Loudon Railway. In its earliest years at least, it did function as a mover of both passengers and freight, to and from its original terminal on the Northside of Frederick Road just East of Mellor Avenue. The dominance of the line as a hauler of passenger traffic likely lasted for only a rather short time, as service on the #8 streetcar line would have certainly offered a quicker ride to the main business district for less money. Still, this service might have attracted a reasonable ridership early on, bound for other destinations served by the Pennsylvania Railroad and its predecessors.
While passenger service appears not to have survived the 1890's, the freight portion of the line contined to operate for many years under the Pennsylvania Railroad as its "Catonsville Secondary," serving small industries in the Catonsville Center, and supplying the Spring Grove Hospital with coal for heating use. In its later years, the line mainly existed for the Spring Grove traffic, with consists of Western Maryland hoppers being pushed up the line to the Spring Grove Power Plant, by any of a number of old Baldwin Diesels. As one observer of the line's later days recalls, the small trains often had considerable difficulty travelling West beyond the grade at Paradise Avenue and had to be reversed twice in order to gain the needed momentum to mount this grade and it's slick rail.
In the late 1960's, the line was operating on a bi-weekly basis, typically consisting of a train every Wednesday and Saturday. By 1970, under the Penn Central, freight traffic to the Catonsville Center had dried up, effectively leaving Spring Grove Hospital as the line's sole customer. When the Hospital converted from Steam Heat to Oil, the line's fate was sealed, and the final journey up the little brachline was made in April of 1972. During the 1970's, the line apparently fell into the hands of a local woman, who sought to convert it into a pioneering Hiking/Biking Trail for the area, but nothing ultimately came of the idea, and the line ultimately reverted to nature, with rails untouched from Beechfield Avenue to Maiden Choice Lane, with another "intact" segment west of the Baltimore Beltway to just West of Wade Avenue on the Spring Grove property. Other portions approaching Catonsville and through the Loudon Park Cemetery have since been obscured, the former the result of an initial effort to spur the trail conversion. In addition, a Bridge that had been erected across the Beltway when that highway was constructed in the late 1950's was removed in the late 1980's.
Today, due to severe overgrowth, the line is altogether impassible during Summer months, leaving the Late Winter and Early Spring seasons as the best times which to attempt passage of the line. In addition to the "main line," there are several short spurs that may be tracked as well. The photos below depict the line in the Summer of 2001 and 2002. Once the growth abates for the Winter, further exploration and photography will be conducted.
Map of the Catonsville Branch of the PRR, before abandonment, showing the meandering line that always seemed to be skirting a Cemetery.MANY THANKS GO TO GEORGE KNARR FOR HIS SELFLESS ASSISTANCE IN DETAILING A HISTORY OF THIS INTERESTING RAILROAD BRANCH.
GHOSTS OF THE CATONSVILLE BRANCH
TRAVELLING FROM WEST TO EAST
A reasonably well travelled foot path from Wade Avenue to the Spring Grove State Hospital has at least prohibited growth over a tiny bit of trackage.
A small clearing reveals rail and over paving at Shady Nook Road just East of the Baltimore Beltway. This spot represents the crescent of the toughest grades on the entire line.
Within Loudon Park itself, the easiest places to find remnants of the old Short Line are at grade crossins such as this one, where the two parallel striations in the pavement tell the path of the rails.
Parallelling College Road for a brief distance, slightly sparser growth reveals more of the trackage than is visible over most of the line.
Hmm, can one guess where the line crossed Beechfield Avenue?!? If only there were some clue!!! ;)
The sight of these rails must be a shock to alert passers-by who know nothing of the line's existence. These can be found immediately East of Beechfield Avenue.
The reason why the line is so well concealed through most of Loudon Park Cemetery is the result of it being BURIED!!! The ground in the foreground represents new fill, while the depression through which the line ran through for much of it's Loudon Park journey is seen directly behind, well obscured by vegetation.
The difference in height between the roadbed and the crown of the fill is as much as 15 FEET in some places. Even the residents don't get to go this deep! In this photo, a hint of the railhead is circled peeking through the ivy, while the impending fill grows closer.
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