An old railroad.net post (which I cannot find; maybe from a previous incarnation of railroad.net) lead to the following sites, regarding a temporary railroad built along route I-280 during construction:
http://www.nycroads.com/roads/I-280_NJ/
and a photo at http://www.railpace.com/photogallery/old-1097.htm
I lived in West Orange during construction, but was pretty little. I have foggy memories of going with older siblings and neighbor kids across the construction zone and train tracks to get to the Essex Green shopping center on the other side; putting coins on the tracks and hiding as the trains went by, and someone in the group being amused when they spent the flattend coins in the Woolworth store, and the cashier didn't bat an eye at the coins. And I remember hearing train whistles from my house.
So here is what I wonder:
The first link indicates the railroad was constructed after the rock cut was done through First Mountain, and used to haul the rock to the western part of the highway (toward Parsippany).
Where was all the rock kept before the trains hauled it away? That's a pretty big rock cut.
How far east did the train go? Did it go all the way down the First Mountain hill toward Orange?
Which came first, the rock cut through Second Mountain, or the train? Or was the train bed re-layed as the rock cutting went deeper and deeper?
The grade along that highway is something like 6% Was the construction train able to negotiate that, or was the grade somehow kept smaller for the train? 6% seems pretty steep for a train.
The old posting on this mentioned where the tracks tied in to the rest of the railroad world. Anyone remember where that tie-in was?
(In fourth grade, after paving and before the road opened to traffic, my father and I took a bicycle ride down one of the highway hills. My front wheel went wobbly/unstable, I wiped out, and got banged up enough to miss a week and a half of school.)
Thanks for any info anyone can add.
- Roger
http://www.nycroads.com/roads/I-280_NJ/
and a photo at http://www.railpace.com/photogallery/old-1097.htm
I lived in West Orange during construction, but was pretty little. I have foggy memories of going with older siblings and neighbor kids across the construction zone and train tracks to get to the Essex Green shopping center on the other side; putting coins on the tracks and hiding as the trains went by, and someone in the group being amused when they spent the flattend coins in the Woolworth store, and the cashier didn't bat an eye at the coins. And I remember hearing train whistles from my house.
So here is what I wonder:
The first link indicates the railroad was constructed after the rock cut was done through First Mountain, and used to haul the rock to the western part of the highway (toward Parsippany).
Where was all the rock kept before the trains hauled it away? That's a pretty big rock cut.
How far east did the train go? Did it go all the way down the First Mountain hill toward Orange?
Which came first, the rock cut through Second Mountain, or the train? Or was the train bed re-layed as the rock cutting went deeper and deeper?
The grade along that highway is something like 6% Was the construction train able to negotiate that, or was the grade somehow kept smaller for the train? 6% seems pretty steep for a train.
The old posting on this mentioned where the tracks tied in to the rest of the railroad world. Anyone remember where that tie-in was?
(In fourth grade, after paving and before the road opened to traffic, my father and I took a bicycle ride down one of the highway hills. My front wheel went wobbly/unstable, I wiped out, and got banged up enough to miss a week and a half of school.)
Thanks for any info anyone can add.
- Roger
