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Road: ( Bridge Hunter ;  Historic Bridges ;  Satellite , 79+ photos) Railroad: ( Bridge Hunter ;  Historic Bridges ; Flickrs: Todd , Greg ;  Satellite ) Josh Schmid , License: Creative Commons Attribution-Share-Alike (CC BY-SA) View from northwest Josh Schmid , License: Creative Commons Attribution-Share-Alike (CC BY-SA) Partially open bridge from northwest When I searched for Ashtabula to check out what was left of the NYC/LS&MS ore docks , Google Maps offered the following as the "signature" photo for the town. Harish Mukundan This looked similar to a Strauss heel-trunnion bascule bridge design, but there were enough differences that I suspected it was designed by someone else and the differences avoided patent infringement. Sure enough, Bridge Hunter indicates the " Patent Engineer/Design" is Thomas Ellis Brown. And Historic Bridges indicates it is one of the few surviving Brown type bascule bridges left in the country, and the only one in Ohio. ( new window ...

(see below for satellite) NorthAmericanInterlockings : see below Chicago and Northern Indiana Railroad Interlocking Towers  (click the marker for the correct information) Pennsy called this junction Indiana Harbor, and IHB called it Fort Wayne because it was Pennsy's Pittsburgh, Fort Wayne & Chicago route. Note the IHB route was really owned by NYC because it is the northern part of the Kankakee Belt . But it was, and is, operated by IHB. William Shopotkin posted three images with the comment: Here are a couple of pix of the tower Indiana Harbor (East Chicago, IN) -- where the IHB x/o PC (PRR). They were taken by Dr. Robert Breese of the back end of Amtrak's EB BROADWAY LIMITED on July 17, 1974. Also included is a diagram of the interlocking. Sadly, the one-time PRR thru the area is but a memory. Eric Powell   The concrete slab for this tower is still visible, barely, right next to the Cline Avenue bridge going over the IHB. 1 2 3, also  NorthAmericanInterlockings Sat...

( Bridge Hunter , Satellite ) Roy Kessmann posted four photos with the comment: Ashtabula, Ohio Bridge disaster 1876 The Lake Shore and Michigan Southern Railway designed a bridge to cross the Ashtabula Creek in 1865.The Chief Engineer reviewed the design and declared it unsafe. The CEO of the railroad said to build it anyway. The bridg e design was based upon wooden structures in use at the time but wrought iron was used for the structural members instead. No one really knew the strength of wrought iron at the time for a given thickness. The bridge was a two track affair having a height of 70 feet over the creek. In a freezing, howling blizzard on Friday, December 28, 1876 train #5, the Pacific Express approached the bridge Westbound being pulled by two engines: The Socrates and the Columbia. Four helper engines were used in getting the 11 car train through the snow drifts on its way from Buffalo. In the process of crossing the bridge it failed due to metal fatigue. The first engine m...

( Bridge Hunter ;  Historic Bridges ;  Satellite . 111+ photos; Satellite of tunnel entrance ) There are long tunnels on both sides of the bridge. Chris Spear  posted Not the most beautiful bridge, but huge. Near Clarion, Pa. Abandoned in the early 80s. There are tunnels on both sides. In the 70s, some friends and I jumped a slow moving coal train and rode over the trestle and thru one of the tunnels. Not my photo. Douglas Barrette commented on Chris'  posting The Railway Age, Volume 45 , p377 The Railway Age, Volume 45 , p379 ( new window )  The drone footage is added at the end beginning at 13:28 .

Kelby Stroughter posted the questions: Quick question for you guys in Chicago, IL. How many yards does NS have around the Chicago area? Also was wondering what crews run on the Chicago Line between Ft. Wayne and Chicago? Larry Amaloo Landers  [Wabash], Calumet  [NKP], Ashland  [NYC], 55th Street  [Pennsy], Park Manor  [NYC], Colehour  [Pennsy] are the major NS terminals up here, most are intermodal terminals as well. The NS Crew districts are Toledo-Chicago, Elkhart-Chicago for Dearborn Division, Fort Wayne-Chicago, Bellevue-Chicago for Lake Division. Kankakee Yard and Burns Harbor Yard I do not think are grouped with the Chicago Yards. Andrew Stephenson NS also has the vehicle mixing center in Hegeswisch. [I assume he means the IHB Gibson Yard that is shared by all of the Chicago trunk lines to switch autorack cars.] Stan Stanovich ...Chicago has traditionally been an “away from home terminal!!!” Road crews run into Chicago from Toledo and Elkhart on t...

( Bridge Hunter , contains a relatively long history description; Historic Bridges ;  Satellite ) The main span is 420' long. The original bridge was completed in 1885 with a 450' main span. According to the 2005 SPV Map, Toledo & Ohio Central owned the route that connected this bridge through Columbus to Toledo. Kanawha & Michigna a route into West Virginia that went through Charleston. According to Bridge Hunter, K&M also owned the bridge. This bridge also carried traffic between the Hocking Valley in Ohio and a B&O route in WV. Both the T&OC and K&M were subsidiaries of NYC and Norfolk Southern got them when Conrail was split between NS and CSX. According to the August, 2018 issue of Trains Magazine, pp 41-47, in 2016 Watco formed the shortline Kanawha River to lease and operate the route between Columbus and some towns south of Charleston, WV. Pages 41-42 is a two-page (drone?) photo of a KR train crossing this bridge into Ohio. Bob O'Malley  pos...

( Bridge Hunter , Historic Bridges ,  3D Satellite ) I noticed that Cleveland has quite a few lift bridges for roads as well as railroads. After Chicago built the Halsted Street Bridge, they decided lift bridges would be too ugly for use in the downtown area so the invented their Chicago Style trunnion bascule design. Photo by C Hanchey, License: Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial (CC BY-NC), Flickr Bridge Hunter has a build date of 1947. But Historic Bridges explains the project to widen the river was started in 1946, but this bridge was completed in 1958. C Hanchey's Flickr page also uses the 1958 date. I assume the truss on top carry pipes. Kenneth James White posted Norfolk Southern (and before that Conrail, and before that Penn Central, and before that New York Central!) lift bridge at the mouth of the Cuyahoga River in me hometown of Cleveland. Known locally as the"Iron Curtain". Brandon Lee   Known on the RR as bridge one. Cleveland Public Library Photo Cre...