Reading / SEPTA Bethlehem Branch (Partially Abandoned)

 railway, abandoned / shut down, Southeastern Pennsylvania Transportation Authority (SEPTA), rail-trail

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This is the former Reading Railroad's Bethlehem branch. The line was double-tracked and ran between Lansdale (junction with the electrified Doylestown branch) to Bethlehem, with limited additional service to Allentown. SEPTA discontinued passenger service on the line entirely in 1981 due to its desire to retire its derelict and poorly-maintained Budd Rail-Diesel-Cars (RDC) and run 100% electric operations. Conrail had killed the signals by 1984 yet still used the line lightly into the late 1980s.

The tracks between Hellertown and Bethlehem were removed in the early 2000s. The tracks between Hellertown and Shelly/Coopersburg (Bucks/Northampton county line), which are still owned by SEPTA, were removed in 2008 to make way for a hastily-planned rail-trail similar to those along parts of its Cynwyd/Ivy Ridge and Fox Chase/Newtown lines.

The tracks between the county line and just north of Quakertown are abandoned and the remainder of the branch between Quakertown and Lansdale has been reduced to a single active track (for the most part) and is used for local freight service. The condition of the track is about as closed to 'abandoned' as it gets, meeting the 'excepted' class.