Philadelphia, Germantown and Chestnut Hill Railroad

The Connecting Railway was a subsidiary of the Pennsylvania Railroad, incorporated to build a connection between the Philadelphia and Trenton Railroad and the PRR in the city of Philadelphia.

The PRR controlled the Philadelphia & Trenton, and had originally intended to directly connect the two lines through the heart of Philadelphia. However, attempts to buy out and demolish buildings in the right-of-way led to riots, and the Philadelphia & Trenton was forced to end at Kensington. To resolve the problem, Connecting Railway Company was incorporated May 15, 1863, and between 1864 and June 1867, constructed a 6.75-mile (10.86 km) connecting line between Frankford Junction on the Philadelphia & Trenton and Mantua Junction (now Zoo interlocking) on the PRR main line, passing through what is now North Philadelphia.

On July 18, 1863, the Frankford and Holmesburg Railroad was incorporated to build a line from Frankford to Holmesburg. This would have paralleled the Philadelphia & Trenton between those points. The charter was amended on April 10, 1867, to allow it to build from the Philadelphia & Trenton at Holmesburg Junction to the nearby town of Bustleton instead. It built 4.16 miles (6.69 km) of line between the two points about 1870. On January 1, 1871, it was leased to the Philadelphia & Trenton to operate as their Bustleton Branch. The company subsequently went bankrupt and was sold at foreclosure on November 18, 1890, and was reorganized on January 12, 1891 as the Bustleton Railroad and leased to PRR.

On January 2, 1883, the Philadelphia, Germantown and Chestnut Hill Railroad was incorporated, to construct a line between Germantown Junction (now North Philadelphia) and Chestnut Hill. This project was directed by Henry H. Houston. This line of 6.75 miles (10.86 km) was built between 1883 and 1884, closely paralleling the Chestnut Hill Railroad (controlled by the Reading), and now forms the basis of SEPTA's Chestnut Hill West Line. Between 1892 and 1893, two additional branches were built: the Midvale Branch, running 0.85 miles (1.37 km) from Midvale to the Midvale Steel Company plant, and the Fort Washington Branch or Cresheim Branch, running 6.27 miles (10.09 km) from Allen Lane to Fort Hill, where it connected with the Trenton Cut-Off.

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