It didn’t last long.

After winter shutdown, and after the funicular passed a 2025 preseason inspection, a problem with the main braking system was found in a daily safety check, leading to an extended replacement ordeal, with challenges that included sourcing parts from France, the need for those parts to be made to order and tariff and shipping issues. The funicular was out of service for virtually the entirety of last season.

There’s more: That preseason 2025 inspection showed that the rubber sheaves on which the funicular cable ride needed to be replaced for this year. The completion of the brake job, which made the machine operational again last fall, revealed that the external door at the top of the ride had to be replaced.

After all the challenges and delays, an event was held Thursday at the Curve during which museum officials celebrated the completion of all repairs and the resumption of funicular operation.

Railroaders Memorial Museum archivist and historian Matthew Wolff and Discover Blair County operations director Morgan Koziar ride the funicular down following ribbon cutting ceremonies for it and the America250 flagpole at the Horseshoe Curve National Historic Landmark on Thursday morning. Mirror photo by Patrick Waksmunski

“We’re confident with the state it’s in (now),” said museum Executive Director Joe DeFrancesco, standing at track level, after the funicular had transported him and other attendees up from highway level at the historic site.

The funicular operated more or less continuously from 1992, when it was installed, through 2019, according to DeFrancesco.

But recordings made in those latter years showed that it had grown “screechy and noisy,” DeFrancesco said.

Now, it runs quietly and smoothly.

Altogether, the repairs cost about $200,000 and many man hours, DeFrancesco said.

Attendees of the ribbon cutting ceremony for the reopening of the funicular at the Horseshoe Curve National Historic Landmark take a first ride after its dedication on Thursday morning. Mirror photo by Patrick Waksmunski

The North American Railway Foundation contributed $60,000 and Discover Blair County $15,000, with the rest coming from the museum’s “own resources,” DeFrancesco said.

The main braking system works like the disc brakes on a car, with a rubber-faced clamp that squeezes the big “bull wheel” down below, over which rides the continuous cable that moves the funicular cars, according to Brendan Betts, director of operations for the museum.

Within the bull wheel, the cable rides in the sheave, which is a rubber insert in the groove along the wheel’s circumference that helps the cable grip the wheel, Betts said.

The door at the top entrance and exit of the funicular is automatic, and is a necessary safety feature, according to Betts.

“It’s a proud day,” Altoona Mayor Matt Pacifico said at the reopening.

Attendees of the ribbon cutting ceremony for the reopening of the funicular at the Horseshoe Curve National Historic Landmark take a first ride after its dedication on Thursday morning. Mirror photo by Patrick Waksmunski

Visitors have often complained about the funicular being non-functional during the hiatus, which has forced them to walk up the long, zig-zag stairway at the Curve to get a track-level view, Pacifico said.

Besides which, “funiculars are just cool,” he said.

Thursday’s event was two-pronged: It also included the dedication of a new, 80-foot flagpole, installed to mark the upcoming 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence.

The new pole replaced one installed in 1917 and removed little by little as it deteriorated, until it finally was repurposed as a lamp post in the 1960s, according to DeFrancesco.

A $20,000 grant from America250PA and $35,000 in private donations paid for the new pole, which was installed by Flag Station USA from Altoona, DeFrancesco said.

A ribbon-cutting ceremony to celebrate the dedication of a new, 80-foot flagpole, installed to mark the upcoming 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence was held atop the Horseshoe Curve National Historic Landmark on Thursday. Mirror photo by Patrick Waksmunski

While making the funicular operational again has been the museum’s top priority recently, a secondary goal has been the removal of trees and brush from the hillside at the Curve, so trains — especially the Union Pacific’s Big Boy steam locomotive, which will be featured at the Curve for a half hour on the morning of July 11 — are visible from below, according to DeFrancesco.

Norfolk Southern and private donors helped pay for that work, he said.

The next focus will be on replacing the 30-plus-year-old roofs on the visitors center and three outbuildings at the Curve, he said.

That is expected to cost about $130,000, DeFrancesco said.

The museum has applied for two grants to pay for the work.

06/25/26 Mirror photo by Patrick Waksmunski / A ribbon cutting ceremony was held for the reopening of the funicular at the Horseshoe Curve National Historic Landmark on Thursday morning.

Those grants would require matches that could be met through donations or possibly other grants that aren’t match-disqualified, he said.

The museum is also looking to get rid of invasive species of vegetation at the Curve, so that it can be replaced by low-growing native species, including wildflowers, DeFrancesco said.

The museum and the Curve play a critical role in Discover Blair County’s efforts to market the area, according to Altoona Blair County Development Corp. CEO Steve McKnight.

Keeping a Curve asset like the funicular in “top condition” is important for the historic site to have its desired effect, according to McKnight.

One of the main development strategies for ABCD is for a certain percentage of those visitors to “fall in love” with Blair County, so they come here to live, to invest and to help lift up the county economically, according to McKnight.

Mirror Staff Writer William Kibler is at 814-949-7038.