Pittsburgh Incline Railways (Funiculars)

[BrianTH]

Indeed, cool pics!

You can also see remnants of the Penn Incline (aka 17th Street Incline) from the Strip to the Hill, both at the top and along the Busway at the bottom.

[FreightTrainRunning]

The base station for the Nunnery Hill Incline is still on Federal Street, I've passed it a hundred times without knowing what it was. Here's an article about efforts to save it.

[tfgrubbs]

There was another Incline on the North Side. The base was on Charles St and I believe it went up to Overlook St.

[tfgrubbs]

Check out this site Historic Pittsburgh Image Collections - An Online Gateway to Thousands of Photographs and Images Documenting Pittsburgh's Visual Past search for inclines. There are some really neat pictures.

[gallacus]

Originally Posted by tfgrubbs

There was another Incline on the North Side. The base was on Charles St and I believe it went up to Overlook St.

I don't know how I missed this one. I added it to my map, although I couldn't find much information on it, other than it was called the Ridgewood Incline, was built in 1889 and burned down in 1900.

Thanks for pointing that out!

[judy reardon]

Originally Posted by gallacus

Pittsburgh has two beautiful incline railways, the Monongahela and the Duquesne, but at one time there were almost 20 incline railways in the city of Pittsburgh. When I moved here, my neighbor began telling me of the two that were located very close to my house, so I became intrigued. When looking for information on where all of these railways were, I found that it was somewhat difficult to determine where they went and what they looked like, so I decided to put together this map:

[URL="http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?ie=UTF8&hl=en&msa=0&msid=117970145623045321625. 0004601256705bce94734&ll=40.441068,-79.99403&spn=0.098508,0.153809&z=13"]Map of Pittsburgh's Incline Railways, Past and Present[/URL]

I've tried to include images and a breif description of each one. In addition, I researched many historic maps and tried as hard as possible to place the inclines in precise locations, exactly where they actually were. Who knows, if you live in the city, maybe an incline was located near your house. Some houses are even built on the platforms of old stations! Check out my map and if you have any information to add to any of these, please let me know!

Hi, gallacus! I have a long "to-do" list, or I'm just your typical procrastinator. I've been wanting to send this question to the Pittsburgh Historical Society: Has anyone looked at Joseph Keeling [B 1821 Germany] aka Keiling and Kieling, as the owner/operator of the Keeling Incline? I found documents dated 1870 that he and his partner, John Ingstler had combined real estate and personal estate assets totalling $105,000. Additionally, I found 3 old addresses: Borough of West Birmingham, Lower St. Clair Borough, and 671 Brownsville Road. Keeling was listed as a Wholesale Coal Dealer. Joseph Keeling, my great-great-great-grandfather, married Ingstler's daughter who was 11 years younger. Catherin Ingstler / Ingster / Engstler bore 14 children. Both Keeling and Ingstler disappeared from the U.S. Census about 1880. Catherine lived to the age of 97 and died in Washington, PA about 1924. Beginning about 1910 there were financial hardships in the family. Some of the kids moved back and forth between Trumbull, Ohio, and Pittsburgh. One of the kids, my great-great-grandfather, lived smack between the nuns and priests at 23 Monastery Street. I visited this location in 2008 with my cousin, Yvonne Keeling and we found an architect, Peter Kreutmeier (sp?), had purchased the whole side of the street for renovation. He provided more background. It seems that the 1910 fire demolished the original row houses. So, gallacus, I'm content now just knowing that I've told my story to someone who may be interested. It would be nice to hear from [EMAIL="you...judyreardon@sbcglobal.net"]you...judyreardon@sbcglobal.net[/EMAIL]

[doo dah]

Bumping an old thread with new information about the Troy Hill Incline:
Research changes information on Troy Hill incline | Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

I don't know why they refer to it as having existed for only ten years, as the maps at Pittsburgh Historic Maps show an incline on the 1890 map to the 1910 map.

[ditchdigger]

I don't know why they refer to it as having existed for only ten years, as
the maps at Pittsburgh Historic Maps show an incline on the 1890 map to
the 1910 map.

They say it "ran" from 1888 to 1898. Maybe it took them that long to get around to tearing it down?

[ditchdigger]

And getting back to what I'd posted back then...

Originally Posted by ditchdigger

You might not want to waste any time getting there. There were two big excavators sittng right next to it. I don't know whether the plans call for leaving the wall or taking it down...

Well, if it's still there, they built another wall in front of it:

https://www.google.com/maps/@40.4642...2!8i6656?hl=en