Pan Am Railways (PAR) Maintenance of Way (MoW) Activity

KSmitty wrote:Irving track machines were swapping ties out in Winn today.

Pretty cool, there is now effectively trackwork from the Willows to 'Keag all running concurrently.

Sounds like they got plans for that part of the line..Gotta be the most trackwork we've seen going on this railroad in years.

Some of the trackwork is almost certainly part of the Maine Regional Railways TIGER grant.

I may be wrong but the track from Bangor to Keag was not part of the Tiger Grant.

gokeefe wrote:Some of the trackwork is almost certainly part of the Maine Regional Railways TIGER grant.

Actually none of it is - the funds haven't been released yet.

pnolette wrote:I may be wrong but the track from Bangor to Keag was not part of the Tiger Grant.

I'm pretty sure that Bangor to Keag is not a part of the Tiger Grant.

Zero scope of work from the regional railways project includes work on Pan Am east of NMJ.... this is all them.

See the "MAINE REGIONAL RAILWAYS PROJECT" page 9 using the link below:

http://maine.gov/mdot/tigergrants/docs/ ... rative.pdf" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Work under TIGER is Northern Maine Junction to Waterville (MP 65 to MP 113). Surprising the decision was made to close the line in the first place putting the connection between the old MEC and EMRY at the mercy of the CMQ. The line needs a lot of work; track structure is a mix of 85, 100 and 112lb rail. The 85lb is shot and will have to be replaced with something heavier someday for reliable service at Class II speed over the entire run from Bangor to Keag. A lot of new ties, tamping and surfacing with new fresh stone would be good beginning to resumption of daily train service over the entire route if that is the railroad's intention.

CN9634 wrote:Zero scope of work from the regional railways project includes work on Pan Am east of NMJ.... this is all them.

Thanks for the reminder. I was wondering if some of the ties delivered might be for another location but I had also forgotten that there was no trackwork on Pan Am north of Bangor.

8 more gondolas of new ties reported to Portsmouth. Lots of work going on in unexpected places right now.

As of Friday 9/16/16, there's evidence of new ties (both installed and to be installed) on tracks 1 and 2 at Wagon Wheel Ayer, although it looks like some finishing work is needed on a couple of the ties installed on track 1.

Tamper working in Winthrop today directly by Main Street crossing. Up close and direct observation showed tamping activity with a minimal amount of additional ballast. Not sure if this might be in preparation for a larger rock drop. That answer made sense ...

You drop your rock, then tamp and surface, not the other way around.

The issue in Winthrop isnt a lack of rock, its the crossing and likely some poor surfacing. And adding rock only exacerbates the crossing issue, because you raise the track around, but not in the crossing, which creates a low spot, which enforces a slow order.

KSmitty wrote:You drop your rock, then tamp and surface, not the other way around.

Well that's certainly what I thought. It looked as if they were doing a very light addition of new rock. This was just before the switch south of Main Street.

Posting on CMQ site for NMR lends a bit of irony to the work being done in the Keag area. The posting talks about the Port of St. John expanding container service for serve the Northeast. Maybe all the work will pay off with more business, both to CMQ and PAN AM.

I eyeballed the stretch of Stony Brook in Westford, MA between Town farm Rd crossing and CPF-309 on Friday 9/23/16 and Pan Am has replaced every second or third tie. CWR looks pretty good there, as well, but the ballast could stand to be cleaned and built up.