…Those are great photos of a very unusual situation. Looks like the railroad is 2 or 3’ too low and could solve it by raising it that much but not knowing the consequences…what that might change, or even make the condition worse…
Being in a marsh they have tried to raise it several times, but being in a marsh it just settles back down. They are trying to figure ways to do it though.
Thanks
…I suppose the expensive way to do it would be put down pilings and support the track all the way across on a trestle…a bit higher.
Maybe there is no reachable bottom to set pilings on…
Both Milwaukee Road and Soo/CP have explored the possibility of installing a trestle across the marsh- the problem is subsequent probes into the marsh have not revelead any suitable bedrock (drilling went down 200 feet in some places to check) to hold the pilings or piers of a bridge. If installed without the help of available bedrock below the marsh the trestle would sink just like the fill/rip-rap there does now.
A similar situation befell the Monon mainline in Indiana at Cedar Lake- the main line was built across a “bottomless bog” with a floating wooden piling bridge and fill (The “Paisley Trestle”)- which constantly was in need of shoring and lifting out of the bog. Originally seen as an engineering marvel- the Monon eventually gave up on the bridge due to costs and built a bypass around the entire thing in 1948.
…We have a similar situation here just east of Muncie on the old NYC now CSX…Believe it’s called the “Selma Sink”…but I really haven’t heard anything about it now for years and wonder if it has stablized or what the situation may be.
That’s amazing to see. Never quite seen anything like it, I guess no matter what you gotta keep the trains rolling.
Bogs seem to get some press this wet summer. The Capital Times (Madison, WI) reported on some legislative momentum on allowing the formation of regional transportation authorities. The most immediate impact of such a bill would be in funding bus systems in the Fox River Valley area, but here in Madison it would open up a funding mechanism for light rail from Middleton through Madison to Sun Prairie over WSOR rails. Deep in the story it mentions that the most current proposal has the line stop short of Sun Prairie.
From the story:
The first phase of the project falls short of Transport 2020’s ultimate goal to run the rail line to a station in downtown Sun Prairie, [Transportation 2020 project manager David] Trowbridge said. The project uses existing rail lines, but the last two miles from Reiner Road to Sun Prairie are dilapidated, and a land bridge would be needed to span swampland, at an estimated cost of $30 million to $40 million.
From what I see in the aerial photos, it’s a pretty tiny swamp, nowhere near the size of Reeseville. Just shows one can sink some significan
Ah yes, shades of the summer of 1993. Reeseville was much tamer that time, thank goodness, because we had other things going on from Sabula to Chillicothe.
At Muscatine, we kept raising track along the water front park as the river came up. I have a picture of our Roadmaster John Francke walking across the parking lot with water up to his chest as one of the last trains rolls by. We had to take all of that rock back out so people could get over the track into the park. We also laid track panels on top of existing track to be able to get a tank car of Chlorine through the high water out to the Monsanto plant at Muscatine so they didn’t have to shut down.
And then there was Chillicothe.
As to Reeseville, since 1993, CP rebuilt the two bridges at either side of the marsh. We drove very long pile through the corduroy which was originally laid when the first track was built. It was originally about 10’ below the track but we found it at about 25’ deep.
The one saving grace about Reeseville is that the flow velocities are very low so there is rarely a problem with the track washing out. Just a lot of cat tails all over the track once the water recedes.
To raise this area any significant amount would involve a lot of work to stabilize the 100’+ deep bed of loon s**t it is sitting on. When we were driving the piling for the new bridges we had to pay very close attention to the internal water pressures of this mass lest we shake it up too much and liquify something and cause the track to sink. We managed not to cause any problems, but you had the wonderful vingnette of the project manager pushing the contractor to drive pile quicker and the geotech geeks saying slow down.
I refuse to identify any of those parties, because one of them could be me.
Great pictures bringing back lots of memories that a career are built on. Thanks