Inclines, or more accurately incline plane railways, were once ubiquitous in the US. Developed to conquer the tyranny of elevation, many of these inclines were designed by European immigrants where this mode of transportation was first used. They transported all manner of things; people, products, and raw materials. The most famous may be “Angels Flight” in Los Angeles which has been highlighted in many movies and TV shows. The larger inclines always fascinated me, especially their operation. One of the largest was located in my home state of Ohio – the Mount Adams incline in Cincinnati. One wouldn’t typically think of Ohio as having mountains, but the southern part of the state mirrors the rolling hills of West Virginia and Kentucky. In fact, in their heyday, Cincinnati had five inclines.
Mount Adams was the longest running incline in the city operating from 1876 until 1948. It was 945 feet in length traveling an elevation of 268 feet. A trip took 2 minutes and 20 seconds to complete and was done 6 times an hour, 19 hours a day.
Initially designed for passengers and horse-powered carts, it was later strengthened to carry large electric trolleys, allowing crowds to visit the beautiful Eden Park and later the Cincinnati Museum of Art.
Power was provided by two large coal-fired steam engines located at the summit station. Not a lot of info on the specifics of these engines but I did find this schematic, along with a picture of the cable drum.
These inclines were true 19th century engineering marvels – and fortunately several cities in the US have saved and restored theirs – Pittsburgh and Chattanooga being two.
Fun fact: A funicular is an incline that uses primarily a counter-balance pulley and the kinetic energy of a descending car to raise an ascending one. Water in ballast tanks below the passenger area was initially used to balance the weight, these were later replaced with electric motors that assisted or retarded the cable.
Having lived over half my life in Johnstown, PA (“World’s Steepest Incline”) and only 75 miles from Pittsburgh, I never game much thought to incline planes. After all, didn’t just about every town have one? All those years of bicycle commuting from the western suburbs down into the city had me using the incline as my primary way of getting back home.
Obviously not (duh! there is this matter of terrain). But I’ve always found it fascinating how other cities design their’s. And realized that, other than Johnstown’s, I’ve never ridden on any of them. Not even Pittsburgh’s.
Jim – great; I enjoyed this.
My mom grew up in Cincinnati and talked about riding “the incline”. Her home was near the University of Cincinnati and she rode the incline to her part time college job downtown at the Kroger headquarters. By the time I was a kid the incline was gone; I never saw it.
I’ve ridden two funiculars: the very short Fenelon in Dubuque and the Petrin in Prague.
Certainly makes ANGELES FLIGHT look like a Disney kiddy ride! WOW! 🙂 DFO
I’m pretty sure I’ve never ridden on or even seen anything like this in the US, other than the cog railway on Mt Washington, which isn’t really a funicular. And the fact that I knew nothing about the one in LA, despite being a lifelong Californian, merely highlights the distance (geographic and cultural 😀) between northern and Southern California. I have been on the 180 ft high municipal elevator in Oregon City, OR which is claimed to be the only outdoor municipal elevator in the US.
There is or was a small one in San Francisco that appeared in a Dirty Harry? movie and several other shows, at night so it was kinda creepy. In ’52, my grandmother paid a call on her wealthy aunt in SF who lived 89 steps up from the street (grandpa stayed in the car). I’ve long wondered if that incline was added there later. I’ve looked on google maps for the street name I remember, but it looks like another street was added across the only hillside that seems to fit.
While there aren’t any nearby to where I have ever lived, I have seen several of these over the years, riding on Angel’s Flight (many times) in Los Angeles last year. The Omni, where we stayed, was at the top of the hill and I enjoyed the food at the Grand Central Market which was at the bottom of the hill.
Years ago I seem to remember seeing one or two inclined railroads in the Smokey Mountains.
Innsbruck had the Hungerburgbahn, which was operated continuously from 1906 to 2005, exactly 100 years. I loved to ride on it, but didn’t get to very often as my father preferred to walk up there.
The old one was completely rebuilt as a very modern funicular in 2007, which travels both on level ground and on the incline, with the individual passenger compartments tilting to accommodate both. It’s pretty cool, and a fun ride.
That would be a fun and interesting ride.
The original campus of WMU in Kalamazoo was built on a ridge overlooking the city. This system was still in use in the 40s, as my aunts and uncle used it. It was long gone, by the time I was on campus in the 70s.
Thanks for this article and the video. I’ve ridden on the Angel Flight in LA once. That was several years ago. I specifically sought it out, being a Michael Connelly fan.
I’ll bet that the citizenry thought of these as great engineering marvels, which they were, and they were a great source of civic pride. I guess that we take some of the great engineering achievements as commonplace in our own backyards. I don’t know about any inclined railways that were in Oakland, but at least we get to claim one half of the Bay Bridge!
KCK had one.
https://www.kansasmemory.org/item/305909
Thanks for this article. I rode on the Duquesne Incline in Pittsburgh about 20 years ago, but for some reason I’ve never given much thought to Inclines in general, and didn’t realize that they had such a pronounced heyday. I bet Pittsburgh and Chattanooga are glad they kept theirs operations – it’s definitively a must-do when visiting these places.
That’s amazing! I imagine cities will be building more of these once more as they try to encourage pedestrian and public transit. I wonder if anyone has made an equivalent funicular moving walkway? That would be neat.
Thank you!
Hong Kong actually has a large system that’s a moving walkway, about half a mile or so long and goes up several hundred feet from the harbor/business district. We found it quite convenient compared to climbing a lot of stairs and/or the hill in the summer heat/humidity the last time we were there.
On a much smaller scale, Denver Airport has a bridge that connects the main Terminal (that has no gates, just ticketing/baggage/security) with Terminal A (one of three terminals with gates that are also interconnected via subway from the main terminal), that bridge is quite wide and domed over a taxiway, it too has a several moving walkways that are on inclines/declines (not escalators, just the flat band version). It’s convenient if a flight departs from Terminal A as it has its own smaller security screening area if departing and if arriving in Terminal A it’s kind of refreshing to walk over instead of cramming into an underground tube train after just being in an airborne tube and then riding several normal escalators…
As has been noted, Pittsburgh, PA had a number of these inclines back in the day, and two survive currently, the Duquesne and Monongahela inclines, both of which climb the ridge known as Mt. Washington across from downtown.
I never rode either one while growing up, but once I had children (and later a grandchild) of my own, we rode the Duquesne Incline for a splendid view of the city.
Very cool Jim, thanks for sharing/explaining. We last rode a funicular last spring in Barcelona, a quite modern one that takes you to the Olympic pools which are open without admission charge year round with a bar on top and allows you to sit in the stands (only one side as it’s built into a steep hillside) below the bar with the pools just below that while viewing all of Barcelona from where it’s situated atop Montjuic and watching the large number of birds flying around and above the water of the pools (pools are not open for public swimming, or at least weren’t when we were there). As I recall it was tied into the local metro system, so no extra charge if you already had a pass.
Great post, pretty much all news to me.