Take a detour north off I-80 in western Pennsylvania and visitors will come across the remains of the Allegheny Portage Railroad, first designed during the late 1860s. Initially, a four-mile railroad loop was created in Woodhill as part of a section of track designed to help export crude oil from the region. However, this loop proved inefficient due to its sharp turns, ice jams, and rockslides. By the 1910s, a more direct route was needed. That direct route was the Rockland (Woodhill) Tunnel, a half-mile largely straight tunnel that opened in…
