Hi folks, my friend Charles Lentz and I took in Horseshoe Curve as a side trip when attending the York meet in October 2019, our last trip their before the full blown Covid Pandemic. We saw trains going by at the top of the hill in full view, three at a time, it was so much fun. It was also raining intermittently but was still a thrill seeing the long trains passing each other. There had been a derailment at some time before our visit and several rail cars were on their sides on the ground. The museum is really nice and the folks very friendly.
We also visited a large hobbyshop downtown and it was well stocked. We enjoyed driving around the small town and saw lots of trains, a fun trip. Once was enough for us as it’s a long drive from Clarksville Tennessee. It’s well worth checking this neat place and watching trains up close. It’s a Wow. Happy Railroading Everyone
I would say that Altoona is a cool village, a country type setting and a real railroad community where Norfolk Southern rules the rails. I think, from my google review that the Restaurant in question, Allegro’s would be a top notch place to eat and have a friendly visit with friends, casual wear probably fits the setting. It’s a village built in a hilly area and in the fall, it’s beautiful.
Village!? Altoona is a small city, but certainly larger than a village! The total metro area's population is around 100,000 these days.
I grew up about 15 miles from Altoona, and I've never been to Allegro's. I'd recommend the Texas Hot Dog stand on 58th street near the mall. You could go in there dressed however you want and no one would so much as blink, lol.
For others, or the OP if you go back ... Just a few miles from The Curve are the Gallitzin Tunnels. There three total bores, two right next to each other, however one has been closed up since the late 90s when Conrail widened and increased the clearance of the other. The third bore, technically named "The New Portage Tunnel" is just a couple of streets away on the town side of the tunnels. You can't really see much of the third, but the other two have a nice little park with an old PRR cabin car and you can view trains from there or the walkway on the bridge over the tracks.
For those looking to stretch their legs some, a few miles from there in Ebensburg, PA you can catch the eastern terminus of the Ghost Town Trail that runs on the old PRR and Cambria and Indiana RR rights-of-way. It's something like 35 miles long now and goes all the way out through Twin Rocks, Vintondale (past the Eliza Furnace), and eventually out to Blairsville. There it connects up to the West Penn Trail which rides on the old PRR Conemaugh Division right-of-way (and maybe Black Lick RR) that had been bypassed not once, but twice, by new alignments. If you venture out far enough, you'll come across two large stone arch bridges over which the trail runs and come to the Bow Ridge tunnel, which is now plugged.
The tunnel is one of three through the ridge, the first of which was for the western division of the Main Line Canal. The second was for the first alignment of the PRR, built on the right-of-way that had been cleared for, I think, the New Portage RR which was the same alignment used by the New Portage Tunnel mentioned previously. Both of the older tunnels are plugged and submerged ever since the area was flooded after the building of the Conemaugh Dam on the western side of Bow Ridge. If you go, check the weather and water levels because sometimes part or all of the bridges are submerged, as well as the third tunnel. There are times, during particularly dry seasons when the first alignment of the PRR Conemaugh Division pokes its head out, as well as some of the canal and tow path. With the seasonal flooding there since, well, inception really, evidence of the canal is far and few between.
All the while, the current alignment, now known as the Norfolk Southern Conemaugh Line, weaves in and out of the other alignments, or should I say, they weave in and out of it! A large steel dual track truss (currently single tracked) that runs overtop one of the older stone viaducts caps off the trip near a small park for your viewing pleasure.
