The Genesee Valley corridor evolved from canal to railroad to greenway. The Genesee Valley Canal, one of several lateral canals branching from the Erie Canal, provided transportation through the Genesee River Valley between the Erie Canal in Rochester and the Allegheny River at Millgrove, southeast of Olean. In 1840, 37 miles opened between Rochester and the Genesee River at Mt. Morris; in 1841, four more miles extended through the village to the Shaker colony, now Sonyea, and 11 miles of branch canal opened from Shakers to Dansville. The entire canal was completed in 1861. Although it never earned enough to cover construction or maintenance, it encouraged the development of communities along its route, including Mt. Morris, and gave residents access to transportation and distant markets for agricultural products, lumber, coal, and gypsum while making manufactured goods and other supplies from eastern industrial centers easier and less expensive to obtain. The canal was abandoned in 1878 and sold in 1880 to the Genesee Valley Canal Railroad, which in most places laid its tracks on the canal towpath. After several owners, the line became the Rochester Branch of the Pennsylvania Railroad in 1900. In 1963, 80 miles from Wadsworth Junction to Hinsdale were abandoned, though sections north to Rochester remained in use until the early 1980s. Development of the corridor as a 93-mile greenway began in 1991, with the first two-mile section opening a year later in Mt. Morris. In 2011, the Greenway became a New York State Park, and in 2014 it was named a National Recreation Trail. Today it links people to the region’s transportation history while providing recreation and off-road connections to communities, parks, and other attractions.
