Photo credit Tom Bilcze Trail of the Month - September 2014 "The Allegheny River Trail is one great vista after another." Milwaukee, Wisconsin: The Excavating Engineer Publishing Company.
By 1900, sky-rocketing traffic on the line necessitated a tunnel with higher capacity. Ventilation in the tunnel was a problem four vertical shafts had been bored during construction, and three were finished to provide air circulation. Work on the tunnel was beset with problems – embezzlement, contractor bankruptcy, the Civil War, and political battles – so that the tunnel was only worked on for 8 of the 17 years it was technically under construction. It was designed for two tracks but, due to difficult terrain and inconsistent geology, the plan was revised to one track. At the time, this project was one of the longest tunnels in the United States. The extension required a crossing of the Allegheny Mountains via a 4,777-foot-long (1,456 m) tunnel, which was constructed between 18. Sand Patch Grade was originally built by the Pittsburgh & Connelsville Railroad (P&C) to connect Pittsburgh and Connellsville, with an extension authorized to Cumberland, Maryland in 1853. Dropping over 1,000 feet (300 m) in about 20 miles (32 km) and with grades as much as 2%, Sand Patch Grade is one of the steepest railroad grades on the East Coast. Sand Patch Grade is an approximately 100-mile-long (160 km) section of railroad track known for its steep grades and curves through the Allegheny Mountains of Pennsylvania and Maryland. A B&O ( Chessie System) EMD GP40-2 enters the Sand Patch Tunnel eastbound in 1987.