Ригельсвилль: История маленького городка в Пенсильвании

Riegelsville is a borough in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, United States. The population was 868 at the 2010 census. It is included in the Philadelphia–Wilmington–Camden metropolitan statistical area, despite being so closely connected to the Lehigh Valley.

Benjamin Riegel founded Riegelsville. The original, and now historic, Riegelsville Inn that he built in 1838 still stands. This historic stone inn has offered food and lodging to Bucks County travelers for over 160 years. The community was named for the Riegel family, as early landowners. They established paper mills across the Delaware River in Warren County, New Jersey. With the completion of the Delaware Canal in 1832, the lands along the Delaware River attracted great industrial development. The movement of coal, a major important product of the area, brought capital & investment to Easton. Boats carried coal, stone, iron, crops, and goods from the mills along the 60 miles from Easton to Bristol. Along Canal Street grew one of the largest industrial manufacturing centers of America during the 1830s and 1840s. Easton continued to prosper as a center for industry, manufacturing, commerce, and culture at the Forks of Delaware and along the great rail lines. Between 1904 and 1926, Riegelsville was served by electric passenger and freight trolleys of the Doylestown & Easton Street Railway Company. Riegelsville prospered when the Delaware Canal opened in 1832 with warehouses and factories lining its banks. The canal closed in 1931 after 99 years of service and was replaced by the railroads. Today, Riegelsville is a peaceful and quiet town. Woods and fields border the Delaware Canal; remnants of crumbling stone foundations along its banks are reminders of a busy past. Riegelsville was a mill town in the late 1880s and 1900s. The borough overlooks the Delaware River, spanned by the Riegelsville Bridge, built in 1904 by John A. Roebling's Sons, Co. and connecting with Riegelsville, New Jersey. It is one of the approximately three dozen bridges spanning the Delaware River between Pennsylvania and New Jersey. Residences near the river built by Riegel Paper Company executives in the late 1880s along "Mansions Row" have been restored. The Benjamin Riegel House was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1987.

According to the U. S. Census Bureau, the borough has a total area of 1.0 square miles (3 km2), of which 1.0 square miles (3 km2) is land and 0.1 square miles (0 km2) (5.71%) is water.

At the 2010 census, the borough was 96.8% White, 0.2% Black or African American, 0.3% Native American, 0.2% Asian and 0.5% were two or more races. 2.0% of the population were of Hispanic or Latino ancestry. At the 2000 census, Since 1981, the coldest air temperature was on January 21, 1994. Episodes of extreme cold and wind can occur, with wind chill values < The average annual snowfall (Nov Apr) is between and Ice storms and large snowstorms depositing ≥ of snow occur once every few years, particularly during nor’easters from December through February.

As of 2005 there were 6.96 mile (11 km) of public roads in Riegelsville, of which 1.74 mile (3 km) were maintained by the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation (PennDOT) and 5.22 mile (8 km) were maintained by the borough. Pennsylvania Route 611 is the only numbered highway serving Riegelsville. It traverses the central portion of the borough on a north south alignment via Easton Road.

According to the A. W. Kuchler U. S. potential natural vegetation types, Riegelsville has a dominant vegetation type of Appalachian Oak (104) with a dominant vegetation form of Eastern Hardwood Forest (25). The plant hardiness zone is 6b with an average annual extreme minimum air temperature of The spring bloom typically begins by April 12 and fall color usually peaks by October 28.