Transportation in West Virginia

Transport in the U.S. state of West Virginia is handled by the West Virginia Department of Transportation (WVDOT) which employs more than 6,000 in West Virginia.[1]

Transportation in West Virginia includes the following.

Roads

Interstate highways

U.S. Highways

West Virginia State Highways

Airports


Railroads

West Virginia train stations
Cardinal to Chicago
Huntington
Charleston
Montgomery
Thurmond
Prince
Floridian to Chicago
Hinton
Martinsburg
Alderson
Duffields
White Sulphur Springs
Harpers Ferry
Cardinal to New York
Brunswick Line to D.C.
Floridian to Miami
Key
 Amtrak only
 MARC Brunswick Line
 Both

While West Virginia was once crisscrossed with commercial and passenger railroad networks, the decline of the coal and timber industries, coupled with the rise of the automobile, led to a sharp drop in track mileage in the state. Many of the former railroad grades are used as trails for hiking and biking throughout the state's numerous woodlands.

Today, West Virginia is serviced by two Amtrak lines: one that cuts through the southern portion of the state, including stops in Huntington and Charleston, and one that cuts through the state's Eastern Panhandle, including stops in Martinsburg and Harpers Ferry. The Eastern Panhandle is also serviced during the week by MARC's Brunswick commuter rail line, which terminates in Martinsburg. Commercial railroads still operate in the state, mainly hauling coal to inland ports such as Huntington-Tristate (the nation's largest inland port) and Pittsburgh.

Aggregated entries from McGraw's electric railway directories report about 98 km (61 mi) of operating track for West Virginia streetcar and interurban companies in 1894 and an observed maximum of about 1,121 km (697 mi) in 1919.[2]

Reported operating track length (km)Year020040060080010001200189018951900190519101915192019251930Reported operating track length (km)West Virginia streetcar and interurban opera...

Bridges and tunnels

As a mountainous state, bridges and tunnels play an important role in transportation in West Virginia. Notable bridges and tunnels include:

Public transportation

Rapid Transit

Bus systems

Rivers

Rivers with commercial barge traffic and docks in West Virginia include:[3]

Navigation locks and dams in West Virginia:[4][5]

  • On the Ohio
    • New Cumberland Locks and Dam
    • Pike Island Locks and Dam
    • Hannibal Locks and Dam
    • Willow Island Locks and Dam
    • Belleville Locks and Dam
    • Racine Locks and Dam
    • Robert C. Byrd Locks and Dam
Winfield Lock and Dam on the Kanawha River at Winfield, West Virginia
  • On the Kanawha
    • London Lock and Dam
    • Marmet Lock and Dam
    • Winfield Lock and Dam
  • On the Monogahela
    • Morgantown Lock and Dam
    • Hildebrand Lock and Dam
    • Opekiska Lock and Dam

See also

References

  1. ↑ "About Us". transportation.wv.gov. Retrieved 21 February 2023.
  2. ↑ Li, Haoang; Lahoorpoor, Bahman; Levinson, David (February 2026). "Streetcar and Interurban Deployment in the United States: 1894–1926". Findings. doi:10.32866/001c.155283. The chart aggregates operating track length reported for company entries assigned to West Virginia in the McGraw directory; it omits 1912 and 1913 because those observations did not pass cross-checks against the validated state series.
  3. ↑ West Virginia Department of Transportation, Rivers Section web page, accessed 9 June 2006
  4. ↑ U.S. Corps of Engineers, Huntington District web site, accessed 9 June 2006
  5. ↑ U.S. Corps of Engineers, Pittsburgh District web site, accessed 9 June 2006
This page is issued from Wikipedia. The text is available under Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 unless otherwise noted. Additional terms may apply for the media files.