14. Accommodating the teamsters created problems
During the planning and construction of the Allegheny Portage Railroad resistance to the project by wagon freight companies and their drivers rose. The wagoneers – teamsters – opposed the project as a threat to their livelihood. Teamsters opposed the canal system in general, preferring to haul freight in Conestoga wagons along the turnpike, officially the Huntingdon, Cambria, and Indiana Road. For much of its distance, the road ran parallel to the canal and portage. About midway through the latter, the road crossed over. After the portage was graded, but before the rails were laid, teamsters simply drove across. Rails effectively closed the passage to their wagons. The Pennsylvania legislature hired a team of stone masons to build an arched bridge over the portage, carrying the turnpike over the railroad.
At first, the plan called for the teamsters to make a 90-degree turn onto the bridge. They objected, pointing out the difficulty of making such a turn in a laden wagon hauled by a team of six horses or mules. A stone arched bridge was erected, skewed to cross the portage near the base of incline 6, to carry the turnpike without disrupting traffic on either the rails or the road. The teamsters never got over their resistance to the portage, though the arrival of freight at Johnstown and Hollidaysburg increased the number of loads they carried to communities not directly serviced by the canal. The canal and portage dominated through traffic between Philadelphia and Pittsburgh, though teamsters still made a living feeding smaller towns throughout the region.