The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1908-12-06
CLAIMING OF MEADOW VALLEY
TORRENT NOTABLE TRIUMPH
OF RAILROAD ENGINEERING

gineering. The desert river is the most
treacherous thing in the world.
The waters of Meadow Valley wash
are today a brook across which you
can step. Tonight a cloudburst comes,
and tomorrow your rivulet Is mile
wide, fifteen or twenty feet deep and
running like a racehorse freed from
the bit. To ii the end OF mountain
range is nothing: the geology of the
country is its pet aversion, and II
changes the geography of the lana
through which il runs with the ease
with which a chameleon changes the
color of his skin. IT is here today ana
cutting a new bed five miles away to-
morrow. while il recl1s not of piles or
! trestIes or wooden bridges. or railroad
tracks, taking them along like spiin-
ters on a millrace.
This Is exactly what happened IN
March, 1907. and it cost s1,500.00O to
repair the work of one cloudburst: to
put this hundred miles of track into
such shape that no cloudburst, indeed
no cataciysm of nature, can ever dls-
turb the traffic which rushes az light
ming speed over it's shining rails
Picture of Devastation.
The San Pedro, Los Angeles & Salt
Lake railroad runs through the Mea-
dow Valley wash from Guelph 10 Bar
clay. approximately 100 miles One
morning in March of 1907, this WASH
was a mass of sand. trees. boulders
and twisted railway line Ties were on
top OF rails. whole sections of rails and
ties were standing on their side, look
ing like some Titan's picket fence.
Through il ali ran the Meadow Valley
river, fallen to a small stream, salts
fed with the disaster ii wrought in a
single night. From side to side or the
canyon the stream curved like wan
dering snake, crossing what had been
the railroad eighteen times, at places
where there had once been bridges.
Today the railroad has not been
straightened: it still winds through the
canyon showing all the beauties Of one
of the grandest pieces of desert scene
~ in the world, but every kink has
been taken out of the stream, every
curve where If in the least threatened
the roadbed has been smoothed out
and the eighteen bridges have beer
completely eliminated.
FOrty-five miles of actual washou'
occurred in this hundred miles OF
track. Today ii is as safe as the road
bed over which trains roll into the Los
| Angeles depot on the Salt Lake route
To make il so cost $33. 1888 per mile
as close as so gigantic task can bI
figured in dollars and cents. What II
1 cost in care and worry and hours OF
hard mental and physical work car
never be estimated.
New Channel Hewn Out.
/ Nine sections of new channel for the
mad river were cut in the forty-fiv6
miles of breakage. From these nine
/ channels 10000 cubic yards OF rocl
were removed, and, before the rOcl
could be touched by the blasting gangs
/ 100. 600 cubic yards of dirt were takeI
out by great shovels. and cast alons
the line of the roadbed to be disposed
of later
Wherever the stream shows its teetl
against the mountain or against ;
sand spit, for the latter is about a!
much of an obstacle to a desert rive
as is the former, heavy bulkhead
have been put in. backed by hundred
of tons of earth and some. Such bulk
| heading is TO be found only along TIL
Mississippi, for the power Of the des
ert river is known only to the west.
| Where the roadbed crosses thu
stream. which IL must of neceSSit!
many times because Of the curves il
the canyon, eight new steel bridges o
the latest type Of construction. hav'
been put in. Six of these are of 125
/ foot riveted steel spans; the other TIVE
have similar spans of 10 feet. Al
earthquake might hurl them from th'
earth itself but il could not wrecl