Portal:Trains/Selected article/Week 7, 2020

The Turtle Creek Industrial Railroad was a short line freight railroad that operated in western Pennsylvania between the boroughs of Export and Trafford, where it connected to the Pittsburgh Line. The TCKR was a wholly owned subsidiary of the Dura-Bond Corporation, a steel products company headquartered in Export. The company purchased the railroad from Conrail (the successor to the Pennsylvania Railroad) in 1982. For the next 27 years, three to five trains per week made the round trip along just over ten miles (16 km) of track, delivering materials such as steel pipe to the shortline's parent company in Export and lumber to lumber yards in neighboring Murrysville. In the shortline's heyday, trains of typically about four cars in length were hauled by one of the railroad's two 1940s era switch engines, operated by a two-man crew. The railroad was in service until 2009, when flash flooding of Turtle Creek severely damaged the TCKR's tracks which ran adjacent to the stream. After cessation of service, most of the right-of-way was sold to Westmoreland County to become part of the Westmoreland Heritage Trail.