Wallkill Valley Railroad
Encyclopedia
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The Wallkill Valley Railroad is a defunct railroad which once operated in Ulster
Ulster County, New York
Ulster County is a county located in the state of New York, USA. It sits in the state's Mid-Hudson Region of the Hudson Valley. As of the 2010 census, the population was 182,493. Recent population estimates completed by the United States Census Bureau for the 12-month period ending July 1 are at...
and Orange
Orange County, New York
Orange County is a county located in the U.S. state of New York. It is part of the Poughkeepsie–Newburgh–Middletown, NY Metropolitan Statistical Area and is located at the northern reaches of the New York metropolitan area. The county sits in the state's scenic Mid-Hudson Region of the Hudson Valley...
counties in upstate New York
Upstate New York
Upstate New York is the region of the U.S. state of New York that is located north of the core of the New York metropolitan area.-Definition:There is no clear or official boundary between Upstate New York and Downstate New York...
. Its corridor
Transport corridor
A transportation corridor is a tract of land in which at least one main line for transport, be it road, rail or canal, has been built...
stetched from Kingston
Kingston, New York
Kingston is a city in and the county seat of Ulster County, New York, USA. It is north of New York City and south of Albany. It became New York's first capital in 1777, and was burned by the British Oct. 16, 1777, after the Battles of Saratoga...
in the north to Montgomery
Montgomery (town), New York
Montgomery is a town in Orange County, New York, United States. The population was 20,891 at the 2000 census. It was named in honor of Richard Montgomery, an American Revolutionary War general killed in 1775 at the Battle of Quebec....
in the south, with a leased extension to Campbell Hall
Hamptonburgh, New York
Hamptonburgh is a town located in the northern part of Orange County, New York, United States. The population was 4,686 at the 2000 census. The name was provided by an early settler, William Bull....
; it crossed both the Wallkill River
Wallkill River
The Wallkill River, a tributary of the Hudson, drains Lake Mohawk in Sparta, New Jersey, flowing from there generally northeasterly to Rondout Creek in New York, near Rosendale, with the combined flows reaching the Hudson at Kingston....
and Rondout Creek
Rondout Creek
Rondout Creek is a tributary of the Hudson River in Ulster and Sullivan counties, New York, USA. It rises on Rocky Mountain in the eastern Catskills, flows south into Rondout Reservoir, part of New York City's water supply network, then into the valley between the Catskills and the Shawangunk...
.
The railroad was founded in 1866 and ceased regular service in 1977. Throughout its history, the Wallkill Valley Railroad was owned by a variety of companies, including the West Shore
West Shore Railroad
The West Shore Railroad was the final name of a railroad from Weehawken, New Jersey, across the Hudson River from New York City, north along the west shore of the river to Albany, New York and then west to Buffalo...
and New York Central
New York Central Railroad
The New York Central Railroad , known simply as the New York Central in its publicity, was a railroad operating in the Northeastern United States...
railroads, as well as Conrail
Consolidated Rail Corporation
The Consolidated Rail Corporation, commonly known as Conrail , was the primary Class I railroad in the Northeast U.S. between 1976 and 1999. The federal government created it to take over the potentially profitable lines of bankrupt carriers, including the Penn Central Transportation Company and...
. After its closure, portions of the rail bed were purchased by municipalities along the corridor and were converted to rail trail
Rail trail
A rail trail is the conversion of a disused railway easement into a multi-use path, typically for walking, cycling and sometimes horse riding. The characteristics of former tracks—flat, long, frequently running through historical areas—are appealing for various development. The term sometimes also...
s.
Wallkill Valley Railroad
It was founded in 1866, and was constructed to match the Erie Railroad'sErie Railroad
The Erie Railroad was a railroad that operated in New York State, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois, originally connecting New York City with Lake Erie...
six-foot gauge
Broad gauge
Broad-gauge railways use a track gauge greater than the standard gauge of .- List :For list see: List of broad gauges, by gauge and country- History :...
so that it could be easier to transport goods from one railroad to the other. It was operated by the Erie for the next ten years after its construction. It came to New Paltz
New Paltz (village), New York
New Paltz is a village in Ulster County in the U.S. state of New York. It is about north of New York City and south of Albany. The population was 6,818 at the 2010 census.The Village of New Paltz is located within the Town of New Paltz...
in 1870, and bridged Rondout Creek and the Delaware and Hudson Canal
Delaware and Hudson Canal
The Delaware and Hudson Canal was the first venture of the Delaware and Hudson Canal Company, which later developed the Delaware and Hudson Railway...
in 1872. That year, steamboat Captain Thomas Cornell
Thomas Cornell
Thomas C. Cornell , an American politician and businessman. During the American Civil War, he was commissioned as a major in the New York Militia...
became president of the railroad, though people thought that he bought the railroad just for his own sake. He completed it to Kingston, but left his post soon thereafter. Plenty of newspaper articles suggested that it was a financial scandal, and the Wallkill Valley went bankrupt.
However, Cornell purchased it again in 1877. Later, he learned, with the help of his step-son Samuel Coykendall, that the West Shore Railroad
West Shore Railroad
The West Shore Railroad was the final name of a railroad from Weehawken, New Jersey, across the Hudson River from New York City, north along the west shore of the river to Albany, New York and then west to Buffalo...
was chartering a route to New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
and that it would pass through Kingston
Kingston, New York
Kingston is a city in and the county seat of Ulster County, New York, USA. It is north of New York City and south of Albany. It became New York's first capital in 1777, and was burned by the British Oct. 16, 1777, after the Battles of Saratoga...
on the way. Cornell responded by chartering an extension for the Wallkill Valley right into West Shore-chartered land. But what this meant to the West Shore was that it could have a new branch. The West Shore purchased the line at a price of almost $1,000,000 in 1881.
New York Central
It soon became the rural Wallkill Valley Branch of the West Shore Railroad, although the locals whose profits were wiped out during the previous bankruptcy didn't agree with this. And an occasional scheme was hatched to extend it to the PennsylvaniaPennsylvania
The Commonwealth of Pennsylvania is a U.S. state that is located in the Northeastern and Mid-Atlantic regions of the United States. The state borders Delaware and Maryland to the south, West Virginia to the southwest, Ohio to the west, New York and Ontario, Canada, to the north, and New Jersey to...
coal mines to bring more money to the railroad, though it was never successful. The New York Central then bought the West Shore Railroad in 1884 when passenger service was slowly declining, as with most rural branches. Passenger service was completely abandoned in 1937.
After that, some of the previous Ulster and Delaware locomotives were sent to operate on the Wallkill Valley Branch, since they were light enough to cross the Wallkill Valley's Rosendale Bridge. But those were all gone by 1949, and the branch was soon entirely dieselized.
Conrail
Conrail almost entirely abandoned the branch, though it was considered briefly as a new route to Allentown, PA, via Kingston, Campbell Hall and the L&HR. It was discovered in 1977 that the piers supporting the Rosendale Viaduct had shifted, and that repairs were not worth the money to keep the line open. The physical plant was formally abandoned in 1982, and the infrastructure was torn out and sold for scrap, except for the Rosendale trestle; a little spur from Walden to Campbell Hall and a team trackTeam track
A team track is a small railroad siding or spur track intended for the use of area merchants, manufacturers, farmers and other small businesses to personally load and unload products and merchandise, usually in smaller quantities. The term "team" refers to the teams of horses or oxen delivering...
in Kingston. The process of dismantling the railroad took from 1983 to 1984.
Norfolk Southern Railway and remaining facilities
The remaining spur from DeGroodt's Paving in downtown Walden to the Campbell Hall Metro-North stationCampbell Hall (Metro-North station)
The Campbell Hall Metro-North station is located just south of the eponymous hamlet in the town of Hamptonburgh in Orange County, New York. It is served by trains on the Port Jervis Line, which either go west to Port Jervis or south to Hoboken, 65.6 miles away. Travel time to the latter is around...
is used for freight service by Norfolk Southern. The station in New Paltz remains along the trail, though the station in Gardiner burned down in 2002. Walden station was moved to a village park, and remains intact. The Middletown and New Jersey Railroad currently provides freight service on the line.
Rail trail
Portions of the line in both Ulster and Orange Counties have been converted into rail trailRail trail
A rail trail is the conversion of a disused railway easement into a multi-use path, typically for walking, cycling and sometimes horse riding. The characteristics of former tracks—flat, long, frequently running through historical areas—are appealing for various development. The term sometimes also...
s, described here from north to south. Note that north of River Road in Rosendale, the Wallkill Valley Railroad actually runs in the Rondout Valley.
The Wallkill Valley Rail Trail
Wallkill Valley Rail Trail
The Wallkill Valley Rail Trail is a rail trail and linear park that runs along the former Wallkill Valley Railroad rail corridor in Ulster County, New York. , it stretches from Gardiner through New Paltz, crossing the Wallkill River as it reaches Rosendale...
runs 12.2 miles (19.6 km) from Gardiner through New Paltz to Rosendale. The addition of an 11.5 miles (18.5 km) section in 2009 extended it farther north to Kingston.
The Walden–Wallkill Rail Trail has been paved and runs from NY 208
New York State Route 208
New York State Route 208 is a state highway located in southern New York in the United States. The southern terminus is at an intersection with NY 17M in the Orange County village of Monroe...
in Wallkill
Wallkill, Ulster County, New York
Wallkill is a hamlet , generally identified as coterminous with ZIP code 12589, telephone exchange 895 in the 845 area code and most of the Wallkill Central School District located mostly in the eastern half of the Town of Shawangunk, Ulster County, New York but partly spilling over into adjacent...
south to Walden, NY, in Orange County. Parking availability is limited to street parking. The section of the rail bed north of Rte 208 to Birch Road is owned by the Town of Shawangunk but is unimproved. The 1.4 mile section from Birch Road north to Denniston road (southern terminus of the Wallkill Valley Rail Trail) is owned by the New York State Department of Corrections where the Shawangunk and Wallkill Correctional Facilities are located (and is closed to the public).
Stations
- Kingston Union Station
- BinnewaterBinnewater Historic DistrictThe Binnewater Historic District is a national historic district located at Rosendale in Ulster County, New York. The district originally included nine contributing buildings built during the late 19th and early 20th centuries...
- RosendaleRosendale trestleThe Rosendale trestle is a continuous truss bridge and former railroad trestle in Rosendale Village, a hamlet in the town of Rosendale in Ulster County, New York. Originally constructed by the Wallkill Valley Railroad to continue its rail line from New Paltz to Kingston, the bridge rises above...
- New PaltzLa StazioneLa stazione is a 1952 Italian film directed by Valerio Zurlini....
- Gardiner
- Wallkill
- Walden
- Montgomery (Connection with Erie RR)
- Campbell HallCampbell Hall (Metro-North station)The Campbell Hall Metro-North station is located just south of the eponymous hamlet in the town of Hamptonburgh in Orange County, New York. It is served by trains on the Port Jervis Line, which either go west to Port Jervis or south to Hoboken, 65.6 miles away. Travel time to the latter is around...