Western Railroad Discussion > One down and one to go on the NEW NWP/SMART

Another window closed this morning on the NWP with the passage of the first northbound thru freight in a little over a week. The newly built Novato Creek bridge was finished yesterday and even though final tweaking was still in progress today, the Petaluma local was the first train to cross it. Track work still continues south of the bridge to the Ignacio wye. While the new tracks is in place from the Novato Landfill south, much work remains in the form of ballasting, lining and tamping. The first series of images are of the Novato Creek bridge this morning and the newly rebuilt ROW from the bridge south to Ignacio. The last major bridge to be replaced is the 1915 swing span at Haystack Landing over the Petaluma River. As the first northbound freight in over a week passed, the contractor was sitting up the a pile driver to place the new steel beams for the northerly foundation. The new ROW is going to be on the dirt road to the east of the old bridge in order straighten curve to line up better with the BNSF 1985 Galveston Bay Bascule span.

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The "new" bridge, now being assembled at Marie Island will be placed to the left of the current structure and the old bridge will be torn down. text and Photos by Mike Pechner, NWP

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nice pics. Seems like they ran kind of late tdoay. any reason why?

Don't forget about the Gallinas Creek Bridge.

I'm sure I missed this... but why is the Petaluma bridge being replaced? It's obviously a local landmark.

Danf, If I have it right, SMART wants to run trains over Petaluma River without slowing down. To do that with the current bridge would require a lot of money to fix up the bridge. And there'd only be 20 years of life left in the bridge, and then it would have ot be replaced. So they went with buying the used bridge from Galveston.

Thanks for the explanation. Do you know when they plan on replacing it? Are there any photos of the replacement?

sliderslider Wrote:
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> Danf, If I have it right, SMART wants to run
> trains over Petaluma River without slowing down.
> To do that with the current bridge would require a
> lot of money to fix up the bridge. And there'd
> only be 20 years of life left in the bridge, and
> then it would have ot be replaced. So they went
> with buying the used bridge from Galveston.

See http://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?1,3432368,3432727#msg-3432727

And nwprr.net has some pics of the work currently being done. I don't know when the replacement is to be completed but they are grading and pile driving now.

Wow. Thanks again for that. Looks like it's going to be a very expensive job. I would think it would have been cheaper to rehab the old bridge, or build a new one. Opportunity lost to preserve some local history.

Thanks again for all those NWP/SMART updates too (and same to Mike).

sliderslider Wrote:
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> See
> http://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?1,3
> 432368,3432727#msg-3432727
>