The Republican. [volume] (Mountain Home, Idaho) 1903-1909, 1908-01-23
Cars Filling Embankment from Cable
way.

way.
too soft a nature for the maintenance
of pile trestle, and the described
method was adopted only after several
other schemes had failed; the second
fill was over deep gorge with good
solid foundations, and the galloway
was adopted primarily because it
seemed to be the cheapest and most
efficient mtehod.
About rs miles south of Cleveland
the line of the new railroad
crosses swamp on an embankment
from 25 to 33 feet high and one and
one-fourth miles in length. The bot,
tom lands across which the line is To-
Gated are used for raising celery and
are overlaid by black decomposed
vegetable soil, incapable of sustaining
any material weight. Soundings
showed the greater part of the ground
to have mud crust about Is feet thick
then quicksand for Is feet, then ten
feet of soft clay everything the hard
blueclay bottom. At intervals the
mud crust was only Is feet thick, and
under it was a heavy underground
stream flow so great that the water
spurted several feet out of the sound
ing pipes. These subterranean lakes
were SO numerous as to make imprac-
ticable the ordinary methods of fill
ing"
Two unsuccessful attempts at cross
ing were made; one by laying track
on treStle built on foundation of
crossed timbers and brush, and anoth-
er by constructing a pile trestle on the
ordinary plan. In both cases the
track sank into the mud, and the cable
scheme was tried as last resort. Says
the writer:
Two e-and-five-eighths-in steel
cables, about five feet center to cen
ter, were stretched from an anchorage
in the fill already made, over the near
est bent of the pile trestle remaining
and on to the farther bents, to which
the other end was anchored. Upon
these cables ties we're fastened, .
and track laid, upon which the
loaded cars were pushed and dumped,
one at time, at the end of the fill.
The first span used was over 200 feet,
covering the hole into which the tres
tie had sunk and which was at this
time a pond OF water ITS long and IA
feet deep. On account of the large
span made necessary by the impossi-
bility of driving a trestle bent in this
pond, the sag in the cable was very
great, and the instability of the cars
quite marked This, together with
the great depth of the fill, necesstated
the constant lacking of the track I'M
der the fill.
"As soon as this sinkhole was
crossed a large trestle bent was
erected, and the long span decreased
by guy supports and timber grillage
blocks. The material deposited in this
hole (25,000 cubic yards in a month"; |
showed ahead and completely carried
away the remaining portion of the pile
trestle which was serving as forward |
for the galloway. Timber
towers were then built ahead and
blocked up and skidded forward as the
work progressed. This is the manner
In which the work Is now being carried
on. Permanent towers, founded on
piles, have been erected far ahead of
the work to act as anchorages, and
the movable towers are used as sup
ports for the galloway"
In the second place where cables are
being used there is a deep gorge with
solid bottom, but calculation showed
that the cable method would be cheap.
er than the ordinary plan saving
about $1,700, or more than half the
cost. The illustration is from the
News-Literary Digest
Worlds Longest Bridge.