A Mighty Bridge

Photo by Dave Frieder

The Hell Gate Bridge is part of the New York Connecting Railroad, built by the Pennsylvania Railroad in 1912 to 1916, the finishing touches on what we call today the Northeast Corridor between Boston and Washington, DC.  According to Wikipedia, the bridge is 1,017 feet long, one of the longest steel arch bridges in the world.  The famous  Sydney Harbour Bridge in Australia derived its design from the Hell Gate Bridge.  It is said that is was built so strong, it could survive for nearly 1,000 years if the human race were to perish. 

The term "Hell's Gate" stems from the Dutch for "clear strait."  It was hazardous to navigation as it was the confluence of tidal currents from Long Island Sound, the Harlem River and from Upper New York Bay.  

As part of the approach to New York's Penn Station, the long approach viaduct over Randall's and Wards Islands is the first views of the skyline of Manhattan for train riders.  Today, Amtrak runs passenger trains over the bridge, including its Acela Express and Northeast Regional services.  Freight trains are operated by CSX and the Providence and Worcester Railroad. 

The bridge is a thing of beauty to engineers and others.  (All photos by the author, except as noted.)

View of the Hell Gate Bridge from the train approaching the bridge.

The massive ironwork of the arch, as seen from the rear platform of the train.

View back at the massive concrete tower framing the Astoria, Queens end of the span.

Same view back in  August 25, 1963, showing a New Haven Railroad freight train crossing the bridge.  Photo by Paul Yurko.

High above Astoria, Queens, on the long approach viaduct and descending towards Penn Station in Manhattan.  To the left, the parallel suspension bridge section of the Triborough Bridge is visible.

The Bleak Midwinter and a Walk Around the Pond at Dusk

Our nearly snow-less winter continues.  However, that has not meant that the cold hasn't invaded our fair city (Cambridge, MA).  The Charles River is frozen.  And so is Fresh Pond.

The bleak midwinter without snow is especially bleak.  The cold keeps one from lingering and there is little to see in the snowless, barren landscape.  Hope is hard to find.

Today is the celebration of Martin Luther King, the holiday to honor the vision and hope he brought to the struggle for equal rights and equal recognition.  There was the usual services, inspirational speeches and, this year, a demonstration in Boston.  Time has past, but the hoped for vision is not fully realized.  At times, we're still two nations, not fully understanding each other.  At times, we're still in the bleak midwinter of relations and understanding.

Back in Cambridge at the end of the day, the three of us took a brisk walk around Fresh Pond in the gathering darkness of the dusk of a bleak, but snow-less, mid-winter's day.  It was cold.  But if you keep moving, it was ok.

In the bleak midwinter, hope can be found if you keep moving ahead.

The setting sun casts its orange light on the Ringe Towers trio across the frozen pond.

Dusk in the west beyond the hill of Kingsley Park.

The abandoned track of the Watertown Branch of the once Boston & Maine Railroad passes the west side of the pond.

Little Fresh Pond is frozen over.  In warmer weather, it is a favorite spot for dogs to take a quick swim.

The last light of the day reflects off the ice.

Newton Lower Falls Branch: Route of the "Ping Pong"

A new section of the Charles River path system opened recently, a rail-to-trail walkway following the route of what was once the Boston & Worcester Railroad's Newton Lower Falls Branch. This very short branch, a mere 1.2 miles long, branched off from the mainline at Riverside Station.  The river in Riverside is the Charles River, which meanders in all directions while forming the boundary between Newton and Wellesley, Massachusetts.

The Newton Lower Falls Branch followed the east bank of the Charles River,
only a bit over a mile east of the Boston & Worcester Main Line

The rail lines in Massachusetts tending to branch out to serve the mills.  And the mills would locate themselves along the rivers, particularly at waterfalls, where the power of the falling water could be harnessed.

So, it proved economically worthwhile to construct this diminutive branchline along the east bank of the Charles, and curving to a river crossing and entering into a village simply called Lower Falls.

The Charles River, as seen from the
rail bridge near Lower Falls

While the freight service was unremarkable in itself, what made this branch special was its passenger service.  In 1867, the Boston & Worcester merged with two other lines to become the Boston & Albany, spanning the state and connecting to the mighty New York Central and Hudson River Railroad, which stretched west to Chicago.  While trains running overnight between Boston and Chicago ran on the mainline, the Lower Falls branch had a mere shuttle service, connecting Riverside Station on the mainline with the branch's namesake village.

Electric car #01, the "Ping Pong"
(Collection of Norman D. Clark)

With the advent of electric power came the widespread use of electric trolley cars and interurbans in the late 1880s and 1890s.  This inspired the Boston & Albany to eliminate the clumsy use of a locomotive and passenger cars to travel so short a distance.  In 1900 they converted a passenger car into their own version of an interurban, and gave it the number "01."

Since all it did, day in and day out, was shuttle back and forth this little 1.2-mile trip, it was nicknamed the "Ping Pong."

(Collection of Roy Lannigan)

In 1930, the "Ping Pong" was retired, and a single locomotive and passenger car.  Eventually, passenger service ended in 1957.  Freight service continued for a couple of decades.  

Now with rail service a distant memory, the one section of the line, between Washington Street in Wellesley and Concord Street in Newton, had become a walking path.  A wood deck bridge sets on the steel of the rail bridge over the Charles.

In Wellesley, the path transitions from concrete to stone dust as one approaches the Charles.

The path crosses the Charles River reusing the rail bridge.

The wood deck and railings of the footbridge.

Approaching the bridge from the Newton side.

Looking north across Concord Street:  the rails still remain, overgrown.

References:
Humphrey, Thomas J. and Clark, Norman D, "Boston's Commuter Rail: Section Section," Boston Street Railway Association, Inc., 1986.
Karr, Ronald Dale, "The Rail Lines of Southern New England: A Handbook of Railroad History," Branch Line Press, 1994.

Except as noted, all photographs by Rachel Burckardt, Sept. 27, 2014.

Tracks in the Snow

As a transportation engineer, I have always been fascinated by railroads, particularly as they fit into urban and rural landscapes. Compared to modern highways, rail lines are much narrower and therefore were built less intrusively.

In the winter, it becomes somewhat obvious whether a rail line is used or not. Here in Cambridge, we have two infrequently used freight branch lines. Running through the campus of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and East Cambridge is the Grand Junction Branch, with about 2 to 5 trains per day. In the western portion of Cambridge, running through the reservation at Fresh Pond in the Watertown Branch, which is recently abandoned.

The picture above on the right and the first two photographs show the Watertown Branch. The first photo below shows the rail line cut into the rock that makes up the core of a low drumlin forming the southern boundary of the glacially-carved Fresh Pond. The second, just a few hundred feet from the first, finds the tracks in a flat terrain. The final photograph is looking down the Grand Junction branch from Hampshire Street, just outside Kendall Square.