a survey, backers of the existing (though troubled and incomplete) James River Canal blocked public funding for the company, so it could not to enough raise funds for construction, although decades later the Chesapeake & Ohio Railroad built the route. Meanwhile, Robinson returned to Pennsylvania. In 1833, he was elected to the American Philosophical Society. In 1833-1834, he also surveyed a railroad in the Tamaqua coal fields, directed further D & P construction in the Shamokin Valley, and another built another coal line near Pottsville. During 1834-1840, Robinson became chief engineer of the new Philadelphia and Reading Railroad and directed construction of the line, including a spectacular stone bridge and a tunnel 1,932 feet long now considered his crowning achievements. The 93-mile railroad built from the major anthracite coal fields of Pottsville to Reading and then to the connecting railroads and port at Philadelphia was the first double track mainline in the United States (after the British model). The route included three of the nine first railroad tunnels in the United States, and was reportedly the first to use crushed stone ballast. (In 1828-9, Robinson had designed his first railroads—the Allegheny Portage and the Danville & Pottsville railroads—as double track lines, but these included inclines that worked better with two tracks; the Reading was the first main line designed at the outset with double tracks in mind, though with only a 22' wide grade that required widening later). Because of the extensive coal fields it tapped, the Reading would become one of the most profitable railroads in the U. S. It was also considered Moncure Robinson's first mountain railroad without inclines—a statement about the transition from the Canal Era of feeder coal roads to water transport/canals. The Reading paralleled the Schuylkill Canal, and by the 1840s proved the superiority of the railroad over the turnpikes and canals; railroads thus became the 19th century's inland transportation system. Horses and mules, gravity and stationary steam engines on inclines, were the first motive power on Moncure Robinson's railroads. Though Robinson held patents on incline systems, from the beginning, he recommended British built locomotives for railroads, especially the recently perfected 0-4-0s with Bury fire box. By the mid-1830s, American mechanics had perfected the 4-2-0, with its lead swivel truck or pilot wheels – designed by John B Jervis for the Mohawk & Hudson – and Robinson recommended these for steeper grade railroads during the