| Walnut Hill SEPTA regional rail |
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The Walnut Hill station site, now the entrance to the Pennypack Trail Extension. |
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| Address | 200 Moredon Road Abington Township, Pennsylvania. |
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| Platforms | 1 side platform | ||||||||||
| Tracks | 1 | ||||||||||
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| Closed | January 14, 1983 | ||||||||||
| Electrified | no | ||||||||||
| Owned by | SEPTA | ||||||||||
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Walnut Hill is a derelict station located along SEPTA's Fox Chase/Newtown Line, located on Moredon Road in Abington Township, Pennsylvania.
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Walnut Hill, and all stations north of Fox Chase, was closed on January 14, 1983, due to failing diesel train equipment that SEPTA had no desire to repair.[1]
In addition, a labor dispute began within the SEPTA organization when the transit operator inherited 1,700 displaced employees from Conrail. SEPTA insisted on utilizing transit operators from the Broad Street Subway to operate Fox Chase/Newtown diesel trains, while Conrail requested that railroad motormen run the service. When a federal court ruled that SEPTA had to use Conrail employees in order to offer job assurance, SEPTA canceled Fox Chase-Newtown trains.[2] Service in the diesel-only territory north of Fox Chase was cancelled at that time, and Walnut Hill Station still appears in publicly posted tariffs.[3]
Although rail service was initially replaced with a Fox Chase-Newtown shuttle bus, patronage remained light. The traveling public never saw a bus service as a suitable replacement for a rail service, and the Fox Chase-Newtown shuttle bus service ended in 1999.
In the ensuing years, there has been interest in resuming passenger service to the long-dormant line.
In September 2009, the Southampton-based Pennsylvania Transit Expansion Coalition (PA-TEC) began discussions with township officials along the railway, as well as SEPTA officials, about the realistic possibility of resuming even minimal passenger service to relieve traffic congestion in the region. Plans call for completing the electrification to Newtown, as originally planned in the late 1970s.
PA-TEC's efforts have received bipartisan support by both Bucks and Montgomery County officials, as well as at the state level, despite SEPTA's overall reservations. However, SEPTA has also confirmed they are willing to reestablish regular commuter service if strong political support exists in both counties.[4]
Walnut Hill station was a popular stop for passengers visiting the adjacent Lorimer Park. Since the late 1970s, Abington Township Ward 2 had advocated the reuse of the railway as a recreational trail.[5] In July 2008, this idea came to fruition at the insistence of township commissioner Robert Wachter, acting on behalf of constiuent Richard Stern[6]; the section of track that passes through the Walnut Hill Station site was dismantled quickly in conjunction with Montgomery County Parks to make way for an extension to the existing Pennypack Trail. SEPTA received $1 for the lease, railbanking the line for future mass transit related uses.[1] The trail is not officially a rail trail, however, nor is it designated as such.[7]
Controversy surrounded the creation of the trail. Traffic congestion in the region grew to unimaginable heights throughout the 1990s and resumed passenger service was seen as a tool to battle the trend. Public transit advocates voiced their opposition to the removal of the tracks, which effectively severed the outer end of the Fox Chase/Newtown line from the national railroad network (much to the consternation of Bucks County public officials who had been waiting for SEPTA to reactivate train service since suspending it in 1983).
The idea of disposing of this section of the line currently occupied by the interim trail was not new: the area was historically a hotbed for disagreement about transit issues.[5] Population near this portion of the line in Montgomery County has always been sparse, and there were few stations (Walnut Hill, Huntingdon Valley, Bryn Athyn, Woodmont) that served passengers when trains operated. Despite small originating ridership, the county was assessed much of the route's operating cost. As such, opposition within official county circles to subsidize operation existed as far back as the mid-1970s. Proposals were floated around at that time to install a track connection where the line crosses the West Trenton route near Bethayres, and to abandon the stretch of track between Fox Chase and the West Trenton line. The existence of the trail essentially carried out this plan, minus the benefit of the West Trenton connection. This is unfortunate, as even in its dormant state, the Newtown Branch is the shorter and more favorable route to the West Trenton line junction, as rush hour rail traffic through the Jenkintown/Wyncote bottleneck remains heavy.[5]
The Bicycle Coalition of Greater Philadelphia also agreed that while the interim trail serves its purpose, the railroad should take priority if both cannot coexist:
| “ | We believe that there is sufficient right-of-way available to support both future rail service and maintain trail usage. If there is insufficient right-of-way within the corridor to do both, then a relocation or rerouting of the trail to preserve the non-motorized route is necessary.[8] | ” |
Conversely, wealthy constituents—seemingly unconcerned to the surrounding traffic congestion—stated the train will never return to the region; when interviewed by the Philadelphia Inquirer in October 2009, Richard F. Stern of Stern and Eisenberg, LLP in Jenkintown, Pennsylvania voiced his opposition to the resumption of train service:
| “ | ...I would adamantly oppose it. To disrupt this gorgeous trail would be very upsetting to me and the residents of my community. I have applauded the commissioners for getting this (trail) done so quickly and so well...I want any issue of reopening a railroad to go away. It will never be supported by Abington Township or the County.[9] | ” |
Stern is president of the Tall Trees Homeowners Association at the Tall Trees housing development in Huntingdon Valley, Pennsylvania. Like many townhomes that abut the railway line, the Tall Trees housing development was built 1985, two years after service ceased on the rail line.[9]
Noted transit expert John Pawson, author of Delaware Valley Rails: The Railroads and Rail Transit Lines of the Philadelphia Area, questioned why SEPTA is heavily involved with rail trails instead of public transit. Pawson, who was head of the Delaware Valley Regional Planning Commission Regional Citizens Committee until February 2011, stated that the creation of the Pennypack Trail on the Fox Chase/Newtown line is a "relatively cheap and quick process" but that "cheapness is its only advantage."[10] Pawson added that "the trail as built essentially runs from nowhere to nowhere. A relatively high-grade piece of infrastructure has been diverted (temporarirly, one would hope) to a relatively low-grade purpose. It's like taking over an expressway to use for someone's driveway."[10]
Pawson concluded by saying "there is no need to pull up any more track. This real creek-side Pennypack Trail through Montgomery County and the restoration of the rail line in that county and beyond could be considered as a single valid political issue. Various groups including rail and trail proponents and others should work together for a joint project."[10]
In March 2011, PA-TEC requested that SEPTA consider demarking their four dormant railroad lines acting as rail trails with signage. PA-TEC was willing to work with the transit agency on this project, in hopes of maintain a high profile for the dormant rail corridors.[11] Their request was based on a federal study completed by the National Transportation Research Board in 2007, which stated that such signage gives "notice to adjacent landowners and the public generally that an interim period of low-impact or recreational use does not proscribe future development of active passenger or freight rail activity. Provisions may include large, conspicuous signage along the trail alignments and/or disclosure requirements for adjoining property sale transactions that make clear the potential future use of the [rail] corridors in question."[12]
SEPTA rejected PA-TEC's request, believing the benefits of such "signage was deemed non-existent, since SEPTA's rights to the out-of-service rights-of-way (ROW) are clearly protected as matters of real estate/railroad law, as well as the individual lease with the County. The same would apply to any other recreational trails presently being used by municipalities over SEPTA out-of-service railroad ROW's." SEPTA concluded that the expense of installing signs, "no matter how small, for the sole purpose of demarcating SEPTA's otherwise well established legal ownership rights in the ROW, cannot be financially justified."[13] This position was echoed by Rina Cutler, Philadelphia Deputy Mayor of Transportation.[11]
PA-TEC responded in the press by calling SEPTA's response "an act resembling Pontius Pilate", stating that SEPTA was "going against their enabling legislation per Pennsylvania State Law."[14] PA-TEC added that SEPTA "has washed their hands of the (Fox Chase/Newtown) line by refusing to associate their name with it in public.[13] Without any analysis, SEPTA has rejected a taxpayer funded federal study that provides specific recommendations that best preserve dormant railways."[13][11]
The transit advocacy group added that they are "concerned that SEPTA is creating an additional constituency resistant to putting rails on a (SEPTA) owned ROW, in this case the trail users," concluding that "the trail use will create an additional avenue of resistance even for those who would never be trail users. NIMBYs... will be avid trail users, not for the sake of the trail, but to prevent rail use."[11]
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