The Towpath That Isn't

That hiking and biking trail that goes along the river the length of Frenchtown is called “The Towpath,” and maybe it will be a towpath someday. All we need to do is dig a canal and find some mules to plod along the path towing a canal boat. As an incentive, I'm offering a complimentary carrot to each of those mules.

But with the path's future uncertain, let's turn to the past.

In the 1850s the Belvidere & Delaware Railroad laid tracks from Trenton to Belvidere, with the first train arriving in Frenchtown in 1853. Besides the passenger service, these trains would bring in coal for heating and industrial power, bricks for construction, marble and granite for tombstones, and so much more. They would also take away products of Frenchtown factories – wagon wheels, farm implements, ax handles, doll carriages, chairs, more wagon wheels, and eventually spark plugs and millions of baby chicks. That 68-mile stretch of tracks later became part of the Pennsylvania Railroad.

But on July 2, 1900, the first automobile arrived in Frenchtown, which was bad news for the iron horse. More cars followed. Then trucks. Highways were improved. In 1915 a paved road to Flemington (now Route 12) opened up and around 1960 the highway to Lambertville (Route 29) was completed. Cars and trucks ate the railroad's lunch.

Passenger service ended in 1960 and freight service ended in 1976. One morning in 1979 the noise of a locomotive at the end of Twelfth Street woke me up. I looked out the window and saw two brawny guys with long pry bars pulling up spikes. The rails were taken to Missouri.

For several years the old railroad bed was just fist-sized pieces of rough gravel, which made for unpleasant walking. But it was very handy if you wanted to drive onto it, cut up dead trees with a chainsaw, and drag the pieces home with your car.

In 1984 the state took it over and made that lovely, smooth path that we all love so much.

So why is it called “The Towpath”?

1. It is part of the state's Delaware & Raritan Canal Park, and the path looks like a towpath.

2. It's hard to call it “the track,” “the railroad” or “the rail trail” because the trackage is gone.

3. It needed a name. The old railroad that used to run through Califon and High Bridge underwent a similar conversion. But it was named The Columbia Trail after the Columbia Gas Line that was installed along it in the 1990s. It's a pretty jazzy name, but no one has named our trail. Anyone for “the Bel-Del Trail”? I didn't think so. No matter; the job of naming our trail was crowd-sourced and the crowd has named it The Towpath.

That's how language works. Enough people misuse words like “bemuse” and “literally” and those wrong meanings become legitimate. So I'm calling it “The Towpath,” too, because my need to communicate overrides my need to be right. But I'm not happy about it. When I say “The Towpath,” I use air quotes. Or I'll say it insincerely, like the way a soldier will say “sir” to an officer he doesn't respect. And I encourage everyone else to do the same.

Tomorrow I'll post more information about the old railroad.