They’ve Been Working on the Railroad
I’ve written a few times before about the railroad tie replacement activity that was slated for the West Medford Commuter Rail station. Over the last few weeks, it’s actually been happening. It’s rare that one gets a chance to see this much work happening on the railroad – we often take them for granted. But I’ve taken a few photographs to illustrate just what a railroad tie replacement project looks like, from the crews to the equipment.
My apologies for the lack of posting recently. There has been quite a lot going on in Dave’s life, including an upcoming house move. Oh, I’ll still be in Arlington, just a little closer to the Thompson School than I am now. So anyway, Alex and I still travel to the West Medford Station on a regular basis and a few weeks ago activity picked up there considerable. Then, two weekends ago, a crew came in over the weekend and replaced all the railroad ties on the northbound section of the Lowell line running right through the station. It was pretty amazing to see. Here’s what it looked like if you stepped out on the platform during the work and looked to the south. Note in the photo below that there used to be a crosswalk over the train tracks, but most of it has been removed.
And looking north, you can see a crane picking up new railroad ties from the piles that had been left there for just this purpose. Notice the section between the crane and the start of the platform, where there are more railroad ties. This will be significant later.
The following Friday, Alex and I stopped by in the morning. You can see all the trucks that below to the crew and some of the special equipment sitting off on a side-track. You can also see the new gravel on both sides of the northbound tracks where all the ties were replaced. I’m not sure how far they got before they switched to the southbound tracks, which were supposed to be done last weekend but were still being worked on today when I drove past.
The crosswalk was removed and deposited up against the fence near the platform. This is the location I reference above where the crane was pulling railroad ties from. I’m actually surprised the fence is still standing, but it is. I don’t know if they will reuse these or not – there is a wooden replacement across the tracks at this time.
And here is a view of the new, northbound tracks. I am not sure if they only replaced every alternate tie in the photo below. That is a distinct possibility as I saw the ties labelled with orange spray paint prior to the crew coming in. You’ll also notice that the pins used to secure the plate to the tie are a different color although as I said I’m not sure it was strict alternation. The mounds of gravel on both sides of the railroad tracks were quite interesting too. They had made those on the southbound side as well as the northbound side. It didn’t look manmade to me – it seems as if one of those pieces of equipment probably have a device to lay out the stone that way.
Comments
Comment from DaveO
Time May 18, 2009 at 2:55 pm
They slip them under. Although I did see them patching the rail one Sunday – they have a device that has a fire on top that presumably focuses heat down on the rail. I really have to get some better photos of this whole process. Unfortunately, it’s hard because I can’t get in the way and there is a lot of heavy equipment moving around.
Comment from JRElliott
Time June 9, 2009 at 5:23 am
On 25-Apr, I wrote the following to some folks I thought might have some interest in maintenance-of-way operations.
The tie replacement operation that was going on around the Winthrop Street bridge and will, no doubt, resume north of Winthrop Street Monday morning is quite a sight to see (and hear). There is a pretty good viewing platform from Piggott Road, where they will probably be by Monday afternoon. This is a reasonably accurate description of the parade that marches down the track much like a movable assembly line:
1. A dedicated machine, riding on the tracks, that removes the spikes.
2. Followed by another dedicated machine that knocks out the plates that separate the rails from the ties out from under the rails.
3. Followed by another machine, that reaches down and just pulls the tie out from under the rail and discards it up on the side of the ROW.
4. Followed by another seemingly identical machine that, one-by-one, takes a half-dozen or so new ties and puts them on top of the rails at roughly the location where they will eventually be placed under the rails. This machine then backs off.
5. At this point, the first manual process occurs. A guy grabs a jig and places it in turn on each new tie that’s perched atop the rails and marks a line (on two adjacent faces of each tie) a couple of feet from the end with a piece of chalk.
6. The machine from step 4 returns and, in turn, puts each new tie alongside the outside rail, perpendicular to the rail, with one end of the tie stuffed up under the outside rail. This machine then rolls off over the poorly-supported rails never to be seen again.
7. The next machine is the brute of the lot. I advances one tie at a time and grabs the tie that’s been positioned in step 6 and, by sheer brute force … no wiggling, no jiggling, no shaking, no finesse … just stuffs the new tie up under the rails, dislodging the ballast as if it were Styrofoam packing peanuts. I assume it uses the chalk marks form step 5 to gauge where to position the tie. Then it moves on.
8. The next machine acts a lot like a tamper, which scrunches the ballast up under the ties, but instead of scrunching, it seems instead just to vibrate the newly-placed tie and the ballast underneath it. (I’m a little unclear where in the procession this machine appeared but I’m sure that it did appear.)
9. The second manual operation is a crew of four or five guys with things that look like many-tined hay forks. They dig the ballast out from between the rail and the new tie and make a little depression alongside the tie where some other guys place the plates that were removed in 2.
10. Another machine (the lightest-weight of them all) rolls up, grabs the rail then, lowering some feet onto one of the ties, lifts up on the rail so that the workers can slide the plates into place. Away they all go.
11. The next machine proceeds to drill through the holes in the plates into the new ties, advancing a tie at a time.
12. Followed by a machine that you can’t see what’s going on underneath but that’s loud with much banging and rattling. When that machine rolls away, there are three spikes holding each plate to the ties, six spikes per tie but the rail is still just sitting atop the plate.
13. Along comes another manual crew with sledge hammers and they drive in these huge paper-clip-looking affairs that, I guess, clamp the rails to the plates.
14. Next in the procession seems to be the “school bus”. It doesn’t seem to have any function in the tie replacement process. I think the crew rode to/from the work site on it.
15. The caboose in this affair seems to have a big rotary broom that dresses the ballast neatly and pushes the debris away from the rails.
16. The job I want – there were two guys one at each end of the circus train with this job – involves waiting for a train to come along. At that point, he holds up a round sign with a W on it and all the machines in the procession sound their horns along with the horns of the approaching train. (With my iPod playing, too … it might have been Charlie Parker, this came out a lot like a Charles Ives composition.) All activity stops (a lot like on a military base when they sound To The Colors over the public address system indicating that they’re lowering the flag).
Comment from Jenn
Time June 11, 2009 at 5:09 pm
Enjoyed this reporting on the railroad tracks, it is fascinating that they still put such care and effort into this mode of transportation after so many other “faster” ways have presented themselves. The subway and train system in Boston is not the best in the country by far but we certainly do a darn good job of providing as top notch a system as we can for the small space we have to work in! And it is only slated to grow with our city’s needs. Fantastic!
Comment from DaveO
Time June 11, 2009 at 10:37 pm
JR, thanks for such a detailed description!
Jenn, I was at the Wedgemere station this morning, and there were still parking spaces at 8:45 AM. I can’t imagine living in Winchester or West Medford or even East Arlington and driving into Boston every day when you could just park there and take the train and relax.
Comment from Ken Krause
Time June 17, 2009 at 10:04 pm
Dave, part of the reason there are empty parking spaces at Wedgemere Station is that a fair amount of folks from Winchester drive to West Medford Station, park for free on nearby streets, and take the train in to Boston from there. Why drive to West Medford from Winchester when there are two commuter rail stops in Winchester? Because a monthly pass to ride the commuter rail from West Medford (Zone 1A) costs $59; a monthly pass to ride the commuter rail from Wedgemere or Winchester Center (both Zone 1) costs $135. That’s a savings of $76 a month or $912 a year.
Comment from Singapore Photography Services
Time June 28, 2009 at 10:27 am
Thanks for providing us with an insight to a fellow photographers experience. The photography blog gives us a good feel of the different countries we live in. Here in Singapore, most of the photography services provided ply along the industrial and commercial arena.
Comment from Michael
Time May 18, 2009 at 1:49 pm
So, do they remove the rails to drop the new ties in, or do they slip them under somehow?