Railroad Forums 

  • Rails and Ties at Wading River!

  • Discussion of the past and present operations of the Long Island Rail Road.
Discussion of the past and present operations of the Long Island Rail Road.

Moderator: Liquidcamphor

 #1568850  by Pensyfan19
 
A friend of mine told me yesterday that he saw a pile of rails at Wading River which weren't these before, along with one stack of ties. He saw more rails piled along the Wading River ROW earlier today. Does anyone happen to know what these rails might be for, or if it could signal a possible return in service to this branch line???
 #1568898  by MACTRAXX
 
PF: Were these rails and ties old ones removed or new tie bundles along with new rail?

I agree with Crabman that if there was any kind of move to revive the Port Jefferson-Wading River line that
there would be press coverage - and probably NIMBY opposition - for a route that was abandoned 83 years
ago - in 1938. This ROW made a perfect LILCO (PSE&G LI today) power line corridor and is largely intact
because of that one reason...MACTRAXX
 #1568927  by west point
 
Line stub might be needed for storage of regular trains or maintenance trains ? How long is the old ROW before getting near residential or grade crossings ?
 #1568929  by RGlueck
 
Wading River would be the ideal new terminus for the PJ line, but the howling of NIMBY's would be heard from Atlantic to Pacific! Cool idea, but new rail would likely be welding and ties would be concrete. Could easily be historic artifacts unearthed from abandonment.
Have your friend find me a Camelback.
 #1568938  by krispy
 
RGlueck wrote:Wading River would be the ideal new terminus for the PJ line, but the howling of NIMBY's would be heard from Atlantic to Pacific! Cool idea, but new rail would likely be welding and ties would be concrete. Could easily be historic artifacts unearthed from abandonment.
Have your friend find me a Camelback.
The Camelback is in Lake Ronkonkoma, next to a sunken U-Boat :wink: Those ties would be much older than the 83 years since abandonment, I'd love to see what they look like now. Absolutely no plans to extend the branch. Once the bike trails go in, that's all folks.
 #1568957  by ConstanceR46
 
Hearing it through the grapevine is not a reliable source. Any sort of service expansion and rebuilding would require thousands of studies, environmental impact statements - community hearings.

Not to mention how much grading, surveying, ballasting and planning it would take. You can't just up and lay tracks on anywhere.
 #1568960  by photobug56
 
The right of way is still there, in case anyone has forgotten. The LIRR did plan to extend it past Wading River to meet up with one of the other branches. One of the thoughts was that one could move trains from one branch to the other in case of a blockage. Now today, if you electrified, it would be quiet, non-polluting. Of course, you'd want the power lines buried as well, and it would really help to do as much in the way of grade separated crossings as you could. LIRR is finally learning again how to do them, and how to do things like double or triple tracking while using as narrow a right of way as possible.
 #1568972  by newkirk
 
artman wrote: The North Shore Rail Trail is currently under construction and these could be ripped up rail, for sure:
I thought all the rails and ties from the Wading River extension were long gone.
 #1568973  by RGlueck
 
I walked it in the 1960's and found plenty of spikes and tie plates along the route. Best thing I found was the bottom of a glass, what appeared to be a tumbler, turned purple from lead reaction to UV rays, with LIRR cast in the bottom. Don't know where it is today, but it's still in my collection.
 #1569000  by newkirk
 
My curiosity got the best of me so I headed out to Wading River today. Unless if I wasn't looking in the right places,
I didn't see any ties our rails piled up. But here is photo of the bike trail's construction progress.
As for the pile of rails and ties, show us a photo or it doesn't exist.

Image