These are notes that I am writing to help me learn our industrial history. They are my best understanding, but that does not mean they are a correct understanding.
scanned from Engineering News-Record page 605 from Bridge Hunter
Paul Hamby posted eight images with the comment: "Bridge over Crooked River. built in 1931 by Rock Island. Still in use today by UP. photos from 1931 and 2015." Since the group is public, I'll let you click the "posted" link. These comments are what motivated me to research this bridge. Monte OlsenIs this on the realignment that, along with the Great Depression, bankrupted the Rock Island? Paul HambyYes. This is the new in 1931 bridge over Crooked Creek.
It was replaced in 1904 and removed in 1982 since it was on a Monon branch that served the resort towns of West Baden and French Lick. It was 870 feet long and 85 feet high.
Dennis Matthews posted
The Paoli Trestle
The French Lick local originated at Bedford for operating reasons, Orleans no longer had servicing facilities for the train. For a branch of negligible freight traffic, the French Lick line had one tremendous structure, the Paoli Trestle. Occupying it is an inspection train of 1947 with office car 90 on the rear. Nick EllermannIs the word Purdue on the side of the trestle graffiti?
Update:
Robert Brummett posted Paoli Steel Trestle, 1909 postcard
Our local newspaper had an article explaining that Warren Ave. in Downers Grove, IL would be closed on 8/28/17. So I checked out what was happening. This is what I saw when I arrived at 9:11am:
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The backhoe with hydraulic jackhammer attachment, the dump truck hauling a trench embankment brace, and the village's Water Utility Repair Team tool truck made sense. And it implies that the scheduled work was repair or upgrade of the water supply. But why do you need a fire truck for water work? To pump out something?
It was not to pump out something because they were hooking it up to the fire hydrant. And why are all of the construction workers just standing around?
Because there was a gas leak that was bad enough you could hear it! From the video comments: "A reality of the 21st Century is that it is easier to make a video than an audio recording. All three thumbnail choices were of the pickup truck. I wanted something from the beginning or end. If you look at the first frame, you see disturbed concrete on the other side of the tree trunk that is in the middle of the frame. That is where they were digging the hole that broke the gas main. Even at this distance, you can clearly hear the hiss of the leak. A few years ago they converted the neighborhood from low- to high-pressure gas service. There was remarkably little gas smell in the area considering how noisy the leak was. I've smelled gas in basements, and there was no sound. I guess a little breeze dissipates the smell quickly."
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The hole on the right under a driveway apron is where the leak was. It turns out the fire truck was setting up to be prepared and everybody was waiting for the gas company to send out their digging and repair equipment.
This is a screenshot from a video I took when I was leaving at 9:16. I was trying to catch the motion of the water leaking from under the truck. But you can't see the water falling from the truck. But even in a still, you can see it is putting water on the street. Note on the left, under the cab, that the yellow hose to the fire hydrant is pressurized. During a later visit, I talked to a fireman of a second truck that they had sent out to the other end of the construction zone. I asked why this truck was leaking water. He said it was because they were running the pump and water has to flow through the pump to keep it cool. Of course, when the fire houses are being used, there would be plenty of water flow. But in this case of having the truck on "hot standby," the cooling water flows out of the bottom of the truck.
My next visit to the area was at 11:02. You could still here the hiss of the leak. The fire department had sent more people to stand around and watch. The closest SUV was labeled Battalion Chief. The three red SUVs had no labeling at all. So I asked and confirmed that they were from the fire department. Are these fire inspectors who are witnessing their first major gas leak? I remember when a house burned on our block, there were fire trucks and fire chief cars from several other suburbs parked in our block. They were just standing and watching. It finally occurred to me that so seldom does a fire consume a home that they had come to see what it was really like for themselves. That is, it was essentially a training exercise.
The digging equipment from the gas company had arrived, and a crew was working.
On a side street I saw four vehicles from the gas company. A digging machine obviously came on that empty trailer.
I walked down to the fourth vehicle because it still had its digging machine. Instead of rubber tires like the one they were using at the site, this XT850 had rubber tracks and was smaller.
Both trailers also carried an assortment of attachments on the front part of the trailer. In this view from the street side, we see this one travels with its bucket. And we have a good view of the jackhammer. Then we can clearly see the chain of the trench digger.
From the sidewalk side of the trailer we can see the augur on the trencher that pushes the dirt away from the trench. The tall attachment is a vibrator pipe plow. I also included the spool of plastic pipe to note that it was less than an inch in diameter.
I took another shot of the pipe plow to get a better view. On top are the hydraulic hoses and the vibrator. Below we can see the blade that is pulled through the ground. The red steel members on the sides of the blade are part of the trailer to hold the attachment in its upright position to make the mounting plate easily accessible by the XT850.
When I got back to Warren, I noticed the Battalion Chief vehicle had its lights on and was backing up to turn around.
There must be something more exciting in town to stand and watch.
The empty trailer I had saw on the side street was probably carrying this rubber tracked unit. The trailer we see here on Warren probably carries the rubber tired unit that we saw from the other direction. It was 11:19 when I left.
At 12:14 I visited again. This site must be back to being the most exciting place in town because the Battalion Chief is back.
But in fact, the excitement is over and the fire truck is reeling in its hose. There is no more hissing sound.
Now I can get a closeup of the rubber tired unit, Ditch Witch RT100.
Judging by the two piles, they did use both excavators to quickly get an access trench dug a couple of houses west of the leak.
One of the advantages of the construction workers having to stand around and just watch is that they are more than willing to talk to you. During the 11:02 visit, one worker explained to me that the pipe is plastic and that they will crimp it on both sides of the leak to stop the flow to the leak. He thought the main was 8 inches, but it looks more like just a couple of inches. But we can see the big green clamp that has pinched the pipe shut. I also noticed that they tapped the pipe to a gauge. I assume it is a pressure gauge. This neighborhood is probably normally fed from the east. Now the houses and business west of the clamp have to be fed from the west. They are probably measuring that the western supply that they are now using has enough capacity to maintain a proper pressure in a pipe that is a lot further away than the western service area was designed for.
Probably the reason we saw a digger left on its trailer is that on the east side there was a valve and all they had to do was turn it off. Note on the left between the yellow pole and the pipe wrench is a cover that would normally cover the access pipe that the pole is in. To the left of the orange-vested workers is where the leak is. And in the background is where they dug the trench to crimp the pipe. I learned later that the two people walking away down the middle of the street in the far background were part of the accident investigation tream.
An accident investigation team explains why I saw so many USIC trucks in the area. In addition to these two, I saw some on the side streets.
It also explains why the gas company has yet to repair the leak. The accident investigators want the scene of the accident left undisturbed until they are done with their interviews, etc. In fact, someone took down my name. If I remember correctly, she used the word "witness."
During my fourth visit (2:09), they were actively repairing the gas main.
Just a couple of minutes later, they are close to done.
During my last visit (3:02), the gas company will be shoving the dirt back into the "clamp" trench in just a few more minutes. They have taped an electrical wire to the pipe in many places so that it won't be disturbed by the back fill operation. I'm guessing the black pipe is some sort of bracing to help hold the tap and pipe in place when they shove the dirt back in.
The gas workers are out of the leak hole and the water workers are resuming their work.
Railfan Extra: BNSF OCS Train
During my third visit, at 12:23, I happened to be on the west end of the construction site when I heard a train coming. By luck, I was in the one place on Warren Avenue where you can see the tracks from the street.
It was a freight locomotive pulling passenger cars. Since this is very unusual, I took a rapid sequence of photos to try to catch all of the cars in the small window of visibility that I had across the BNSF railyard. When I finally saw the theater car at the end, I realized it was a rather long OCS (Office Car Special) train. The following are cropped versions of the photos I took. Looking at the windows at the end of the last car, they don't have the stair step arrangement that a theater car would have. And I see that the car is domed. So it must have been an old dome car that has been converted into a fancy observation car.
Ten years ago today, my obscure little hobby of hunting down, photographing, and writing about bridges intersected with a major American news story when the unnamed I-35W bridge over the Mississippi River collapsed during the height of rush hour on August 1, 2007.
I vividly recall the first time I saw the underside of this structure. My impression was that there wasn't really that much holding that puppy up for being such a major highway crossing. And like the World Trade Center and the Space Shuttle, it proved to be a fleetingly temporary monument to the era when human engineering technology was invincible.
Another lesson from the affair is that people, especially when acting in groups, tend to not take action on problems until they become an unavoidable crisis. Those concerned about global climate change should take note of this and realize that nothing significant is likely to be done until there is some unavoidable crisis like Washington DC or New York City flooding from rising sea levels or a billion people dying of heatstroke. Folks need to plan according to group mentality rather than to what makes sense.
Daniel Rudelt posted two photos with the comment: "My first bridge project. I-35 W Minnesota 2008." Bob MillerDerik Wolfe that was Amix’s 4600 series 3 ringer series 2 s/n 1039 with #35 boom.
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Kevin Copple commented on Daniel's post
There were two 4600 ringers on that job. One was Lampsons set up on bohemian flats. And that is the one I ran. The red one on the barge I think came in from somewhere in Washington state. It had a fixed cab and two separate motors. Andy Garcia was the operator.
Kevin Copple posted Lampson 4600 ringer at lay down yard for segments on I35 bridge rebuild 2006-07. Green iron in back ground is from the collapsed bridge and where NTSB did some of their investigation.
JohnWeeks_washington "The material on the riverbank is the remains of the I-35W bridge, which collapsed 18 months prior to this photo being taken. The bridge bridge truss sections were partially reassembled at this location."
I knew a couple State of Minnesota bridge inspectors. This was a real wake-up call. Their standard procedure was to judge the bridge’s current condition against its when-built condition. No one questioned the original design. In the case of the 35W bridge in Minneapolis, cantilevered lanes had been added, and a re-decking project was in progress - with all construction materials stored on the bridge itself for lack of space elsewhere. According to the original engineering, it was still well within its design strength. However, the original engineering was flawed. The gusset plates connecting the various members were 1/2” thick, when they should have been double that. Bridge inspections had noted some of those 1/2” gussets as having 1” deflection. But the loss of cross-section from corrosion was within limits, so no problem. It’s ultimate failure was a chain reaction that started when one very overloaded gusset plate gave up.
What did this bridge in was several factors. It was originally built with 6 lanes in 1967. It was widened to 8 lanes over time. As you mentioned, they were cantilevered in. It originally had a road base that was 6.5 inches thick of reinforced concrete. When the roadway was widened to 8 lanes, the road base was increased to 8 inches thick. The construction equipment and materials that were stored on the bridge added an additional 300 or so tons of weight on the bridge. Too thin of gusset plates, and frozen roller expansion bearings on the mounting feet all contributed to the failure of the bridge.
Every one of my postings for a bridge in the Illinois (wwIll label) or Mississippi (wwMiss label) should have a link to John's work at the top of the post. He started taking bridge pictures early enough that the old truss bridges along the Illinois River were still standing. By the time I started taking pictures (2014), they had been replaced by steel girder bridges.
Please access John's link to more information on the old and new bridges, and the disaster.
