More Tuesday morning rail news:
— The city of Jackson, Miss., is suing Canadian National over a long-disputed underpass beneath the railroad’s right-of-way, demanding CN pays the full cost of reopening the once heavily-used route. The Jackson Clarion Ledger reports the city says the closure of Walter Dutch Welch Drive in west Jackson — shut down by the railroad four years ago — delays emergency medical responses and eliminates a route that allowed area residents to avoid crossings on major roads that are often blocked by trains. CN cited safety concerns when it filled in the underpass in 2016. The railroad declined comment to the newspaper on Monday.
— BNSF Railway has opened a new segment of quadruple-track main line in Winslow, Ariz. The addition of the fourth track “facilitates greater throughput at this crew change location by offering a pass-through route for trains traveling at higher rates of speeds,” the railroad said in a message to customers. It is the latest addition to a series of capacity improvement projects on the railroad’s Southern Transcon, joining projects in Amarillo, Texas; Belen, N.M., and Needles, Calif.
— Barges struck a Kansas City Southern bridge over the Mississippi River at Vicksburg, Miss., on Monday afternoon, closing the bridge to rail traffic. It was the third strike of the bridge this month. The Vicksburg Post reports the barges being pushed by the Captain Buck Lay hit three piers of the 90-year-old bridge, with some breaking away and also striking the adjacent Interstate 20 bridge.
Been across the old US 80, now KCS bridge when highway lanes still used. Was talk years ago to build large concrete bumpers on both sites of both (railroad and I-20) bridges to prevent barge strikes (like what happened). When water is high (like now) river current is tricky. River has sharp bend (more than. 90 degrees) to West just up river from bridges. Coming down river the tow wants to push wide East to the Mississippi side of river. Going up stream, tow’s sometimes try to cut bend short so the head end doesn’t get pushed to the Mississippi side also. Not the best place to put a bridge.
Re CN in Jackson, Ms. Try looking at the 100 year flood plain map for Jackson. The flood zone stops at the CN embankment, except at the closed crossing.
My guess is CN is seeing it easier to litigate with the city before a potential flood rather being sued after a flood for creating the path for a flood.
If you look at Google Maps before looking at the flood map you can find the location pretty easily.
https://geology.deq.ms.gov/floodmaps/Viewer/index.html
As I’ve said before I’m no great expert, just a worn out truck driver. If you need legal counsel call your local Bar Association, they keep lists of lawyers looking for clients.
if you follow the link, the pictures of the underpass in Jackson makes it look like it was a single lane roadway with a clearance that couldn’t have been more than 9 feet. Still can’t understand how a railroad can close a city street, though.
John Rice – The news story reads (to me) that the highway was under the railroad, and the bridge carried the tracks. So they filled in the underpass because their bridge was unsafe. Doesn’t seem to make sense, if it carried the tracks. Repair or renew the bridge to protect your trains. Your story, which makes more sense about a dispute arising, concerns the highway bridge over the railroad.
Since the railroad is the bridge owner, they are on the hook for maintaining it.
I would surmise that CN came to Jackson looking for some money to fix it and came up empty, so they closed it.
Unfortunately this is a normal occurrence. I remember as far back as the late 60’s early 70’s the town I grew up in would have these protracted arguments with the B&O about fixing the road bridges they had built in 1911. When the city refused to pay for their upkeep (because it belonged to the RR) the B&O would close the bridge. This would force all traffic to either the one remaining or to a ground level crossing.
One year it got so bad, you could see the double track below from the middle of the roadway due to the holes.. The “sidewalk” which was made up of old ties bolted together had rotted and fallen out in places and kids were jumping over the gaps walking home from school.
Finally the city had the bridge condemned and filed a complaint with the ICC on B&O negligence.
The bridge finally got replaced with a concrete pylon based bridge by CSX, but only the portion directly over the tracks. The approaches with the original 1911 iron fencing were left behind and are still there today.
Barges haven’t been towed since the Erie canal. (Ropes don’t push well) Even paddle wheel boats pushed them. If you Google Vicksburg, the river makes a 90 degree turn before the bridge. It has been a problem spot for a long time. Currents are worse in flood stage. A recent news wire article had a link to a report on a bridge strike from2019
About the CN bridge. An underpass (CRI&P)in my home town was the result of locals going under a trestle as a short cut. When they filled in the trestle they made a one lane underpass. When it needed replaced,SP said no. MoDot got a grant to pay for some of the replacement bridge
If that bridge has been hit three times in one month (and apparently it is frequently struck) I would wager the problem is not the tow pilots, but local conditions which cause the strikes.
Leslie Odom Jr. Geraldine Ferraro. Paul Simon. Art Garfunkel. Donald J. Trump. Cyndi Lauper. Spider Jorgenson. Archie Bunker. Bob Cousy. Mario Cuomo. Queensborough natives all. And let’s not forget Jack Kerouac lived in Queens for a time, though he was born and raised in Lowell, Massachusetts.
But the greatest Queensborough native of all: George Pins. Like Wow!
Mr. McFarland, got to say I don’t think they could “go back” to towing barges cause they never have.
Pictures I’ve seen of tow boats from 100 years ago show them pushing barges. I don’t know a thing about why they’re pushed and not towed however…
I want to add one more comment to my last post. I went to High School in Forest Hills, Queens, New York City. A couple blocks adjacent to our house was what had been a large 1920’s development called Forest Hills Gardens, which was laced with streets. One day a year, the Forest Hills Gardens Corporation closed the streets to the public. This apparently kept them from becoming public. Offenders who dared park there found “private” notices glued to their windows with what must have been the predecessor to Gorilla Glue.
Walter Hoffman – I’m thinking the same thing. Maybe it wasn’t a city street, but some sort of easement across railroad-owned land. That could give the railroad more control. Of course, as Anna will agree, there is adverse possession, which would give ownership to the city.
Anna Harding,
No, it’s the tow pilots at fault(aren’t they supposed to be aware of currents along the Mississippi?), at least it was for the one the week before) when that one was described, the tow pilot missed the correct channel…perhaps they need to switch back to actually towing the barges and not pushing them(as most do).
Precision Scheduled Navigation?
The Mississippi is VERY VERY high this year. It’s been running near flood stage here in New Orleans for several months.
It’s currently above flood stage at Vicksburg so this is not really a surprise. Flood stage is 43′ and it’s 46.5′.
https://water.weather.gov/ahps2/hydrograph.php?wfo=jan&gage=vckm6