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The eastern half of the Westmoreland Heritage Trail runs about eight and a half miles of crushed limestone from Saltsburg, where it shares a trailhead with the West Penn Trail, west through Slickville to the John Rangos Trail Access outside Delmont. It leaves Saltsburg over two old railroad bridges and a short tunnel, stays nearly level to the Sara Steele lot, then climbs at a steady rail grade into the former coal town of Slickville. Beyond Slickville the trail rolls on through woods and a crossing of Beaver Run Reservoir to the Delmont end. The trail stops there for now; the western segment picks up again in Export, and the gap between is the next section to be built.
Westmoreland Heritage Trail: East
Your comfort. Prognosticated.
-Cory
In a typical year the Westmoreland Heritage Trail: East has about 107 to 153 days of excellent weather for popular activities such as hiking, dog walking, e-biking, birding, biking, running, and walking, with April, May, and October the best months.
Hourly comfort scores for the next 15 days of weather, tuned to your activity and your own thresholds.
Plan your visit to this trail. Get the best windows for a comfortable outing.
Enjoy the Westmoreland Heritage Trail: East!
In half of past years, color along the Westmoreland Heritage Trail: East peaks October 18 to 28, typically around October 23. The trail has 47% deciduous coverage, with the majority being black cherry, red maple, sugar maple, northern red oak, and white ash.
George Westinghouse chartered the Turtle Creek Valley Railroad in 1886 to reach the natural gas fields around Murrysville. Trains reached Murrysville in 1891 and Export in 1892. The Pennsylvania Railroad ran the line from 1891 and bought it outright in 1903. As the Turtle Creek Branch it eventually ran from Trafford to Saltsburg, a town that grew up on salt wells and the Main Line Canal. Gas was the reason for the charter, but coal became the cargo. Passenger trains ran too, later as a single diesel car called the Doodlebug, until 1936. Trains last ran through Slickville in the late 1950s, and the Pennsylvania Railroad folded into Penn Central in 1968. The Trafford end lived on as the Turtle Creek Industrial Railroad, bought from Conrail by Dura-Bond in 1982, until a flash flood in June 2009 washed out its embankment. Westmoreland County then bought most of the corridor, and volunteers of the Westmoreland Heritage Trail Chapter of the Regional Trail Corporation helped build the trail in stages. Saltsburg to Slickville opened in the fall of 2007. The extension toward Delmont opened in 2013, Trafford to Monroeville in 2017, and Murrysville to Export in 2019. The Delmont to Export gap is next. This eastern segment holds the Saltsburg end: the two rail bridges at Saltsburg, the short tunnel under PA 981, the 1917 company town of Slickville, and the crossing of Beaver Run Reservoir toward the Delmont lot.
