Live to Ride...Ride to Eat

[Nortoon_imp]

Thanks, suhawk!

Great report Stichill. I really like railway structures too, particularly that they don’t seem to need guard rails of any description. Not that it would be easy to make one strong enough to stop a falling train.

In my misspent youth I trespassed on many railroad properties and rights-of-way. One of them was this viaduct:



It was a busy double-tracked mainline heading north-south on the eastern seaboard of the US. The only refuge for a human on foot was found at every third arch support, where a shallow rectangular bump-out was located that had five-foot / 152 cm walls around it. There were many occasions where I literally ran for my life to one of them. One was never more than one-and-a-half arches away from safety, but in some instances the closest refuge meant that you had to run toward the oncoming train.

The default option in the event that making it to a bump-out wasn't possible was to leap onto the other track. Which wasn't a bad option, provided there wasn't another train on it or approaching. Thankfully, I never had to jump onto the other track and always made it safely to a bump-out. The welded rails would quietly "sing" a few moments before the train appeared, so there was plenty of notice if you were vigilant. I have to say: even motorcycling cannot compare to the rush of running away from an oncoming freight train and then standing three feet / 1 m away from the thundering locomotive and rushing cars as they roared past.

In the old days of wooden trestles these small platforms held water barrels in case the sparks from a steam engine ignited the creosote on the ties. No need for them on this concrete structure, so they must be preplanned for mischievous kids.

I walked a smaller trestle when I was 10 while fishing with friends.

They would always cross it quicker and start yelling train. I was so terrified of it, I had recurring dreams about falling off of it. It occurred so often I finally said to myself during a fall "you're dreaming". I woke up just as I felt the impact of hitting the rocks in the rapids. Took a while for my eyes to adjust enough to have me realize I was in my own bedroom. Never had that dream again.

That trestle is now part of the Carleton University Campus and has regular light rail passenger trains crossing it. Sure looked bigger to a 10 year old than the photo.