Tag: Market Frankford Line

Timeline of Philadelphia Transit Lines

May 6, 2021 / R4 / 0 Comments

About a week ago, I came across a reddit post displaying the timeline of Washington DC’s Metro development. Needless to say, I set out to create a similar graphic for Philadelphia.

The Philadelphia Rapid Transit Timeline spans 145 years, three transit authority eras and four lines that qualify as rapid transit. The majority of development happened prior to World War II with 54 stations being opened before 1940. Since then, another 27 stations have opened, the majority of them being related to PATCO.

No station has opened since the Broad Street Spur’s Chinatown Station replaced Vine Street in construction necessitated by the building of the Commuter Rail tunnel in the 1980s.

Philadelphia’s Transit Plan vision for 2045 does include several projects that have been added to the timeline as proposals. Only the reopening of the Franklin Square station on the PATCO line seems guaranteed at this point.

Check out the timeline, and of course, let me know if you have any corrections or comments.

Walking Under Market Street Has Been a Thing for More Than a Century

October 1, 2019 / R4

Billy Penn’s Michaela Winberg successfully navigated the path from the just opened Fashion District all the way to the glistening Comcast Technology Center. There were some missteps along the way but in the end she made it.

It’s a trek I’ve made numerous times in my youth and wanted to do myself since the Gallery reopened (lets face it, it’ll always be the Gallery). So I’m a bit jealous Winberg beat me to it. But if I cannot be first to document the journey, I’m happy to share some history of the path.

The underground passageways date back to the opening of the Market Street Subway in 1903. Back in those early days (and even much later), Market Street stores utilized the concourses with display windows and entrances to their shops. Into the 1960s, Gimbels promoted Tuesday sales in its “Gimbels Subway Store.”

As a hoarder of Philadelphia transit maps and photographs I have some items to share from a 1908 book on the Market Frankford Line. Unfortunately, I haven’t always been great about documenting where I found these images. So if anyone knows where the source material was, I’d appreciate the insight.

This 1908 photograph shows live plants, patriotic bunting and window displays in the subway concourse.

Better Line Maps for SEPTA

February 19, 2019 / R4 / 0 Comments

The overall SEPTA system map has long been maligned as a “blobby mess.” Transit Maps gave the 2011 edition of the map a stinging one-and-a-half star rating.

SEPTA should feel lucky that no one has rated their line maps for the Broad Street line or Market-Frankford line. These are abominations in their own right. No consistency with the overall system map, confusing letters, colors and variable thickness in lines all gather to lessen the usability of the system.

Why Isn’t There a Stop Between 15th and 30th Street on the Market Frankford Line?

April 15, 2016 / R4 / 0 Comments

One of the more puzzling things about the Market Frankford Line is the lack of a station between 15th and 30th Street stations. Especially when you consider that today, all of the city’s tallest office buildings are clustered between 17th and 20th Streets, along Market. After all there are 5 stops east of 15th along Market. Then none west of 15th until the the subway crosses under the Schuylkill River to 30th Street.

To understand how this happened, you have to understand the topography of Philadelphia when the El was constructed. The might Pennsylvania Railroad’s Broad Street Station brought passengers from across the region to Philadelphia via a viaduct that ran adjacent to Market Street. The two-story tall viaduct was known as the “Chinese Wall” to locals and with its noisy, smoking trains and dark underpasses, left the area west of Broad as an undesirable address.