PA: CamTran still aims to get Incline operating by end of year

The Cambria County Transit Authority is still hopeful that the Johnstown Inclined Plane will be operational before the end of this year.

The well-known tourist attraction has been closed since February 2022 as extensive repairs and modernization upgrades have been made.

Several key steps still remain to be done, even as the project enters its final months.

Conductors and operators need to be hired and trained.

Installation of new rope that helps move the cars is scheduled to commence during the week of Sept. 1, according to CamTran Chief Financial Officer Kim Morley, who emailed a statement after the board’s regular monthly meeting Friday. The process is expected to take two weeks.

Then a 30-day commissioning process, which involves the Pennsylvania Department of Labor and Industry and the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation’s State Safety Oversight Division, is scheduled to get underway Oct. 13.

Final authorization to begin operations and carry passengers on the Inclined Plane is contingent upon approval from L&I, SSOA and CamTran.

“Each entity plays a vital role in ensuring the system meets all regulatory, safety and operational standards prior to opening,” Morley said.

CamTran Chairman Joe Slifko added: “These different groups in these layers of commissioning, they all have their checklists that they have to go through. Given that it’s a unique project, it’s going to take a while to get through this process once we get the cabling in and all that kind of stuff. There’s just a lot to it.”

The Inclined Plane was in need of a major overhaul after years of use.

Following the May 31, 1889, flood that killed more than 2,200 people, the Cambria Iron Company built the Inclined Plane on Yoder Hill as a way to carry people, horses, wagons and materials between Westmont on the hilltop and Johnstown in the valley. It opened June 1, 1891.

“One of the big things that the public doesn’t understand is we’re trying to take a piece of public transportation that was originally designed and manufactured in the 1890s and we’re trying to apply 21st-century regulations and safety features,” said Ed Dreikorn, the board’s vice chairman. “It’s trying to merge the old with the new, and being in compliance is a challenge.”

Dreikorn added: “If we had everybody in the room at once, we could probably get a lot of things done a lot faster, more efficiently, but that’s just not reality.”

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