Western Railroad Discussion > New verticle lift bridge for CN

After years of being listed as a navigation hazard and help from the government the Ex EJ&E now CN
Bridge 552 near Dresden Lock and Dam on the Illinois river upstream from Morris IL is in its final
phase of construction. I know there is some civil engineers on this site and wondering how the
contractor is going to slide the lift span in place. Pics were taken yesterday. Dan

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More pics.

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Final view is looking north from Collins Road IIRC Railroad calls this Devine.
This is a 500mm shot looking down the Illinois River Line. The new span sits to
the left of the towers. Dan

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That nice new lift span for a weed line? Gotta love tax dollars at work

I presume the lack of an operable bridge and the weeds might be related?!

How is CN using this line? Is it part of the ex-EJ&E main that is planned to host 20+ trains a day? It looks more like a branch.

dt8089 Wrote:
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> I know there is some civil
> engineers on this site and wondering how the
> contractor is going to slide the lift span in
> place.

When CN made a bridge replacement at Ste-Anne-de-Bellevue near Montreal about a decade ago, they moored a large barge in the river which had the new spans raised in place on cribbing just south of the old one. A multi-wheeled "crawler truck" was positioned beneath the old span, which was then cut at its ends and jacked up a few inches. The crawler then moved the old span north and onto cribbing of its own, where it was cut up and removed over the next few days.

In the meantime, the crawler was used to lift the new spans (there were 2 of them), and move them into position on the piers.

In your pictures, it looks like the left end of the new lift span is missing a few pieces so it can fit into the vertical structure when it is finally moved into place.

Ray

It is a branch. The end of one to be exact. There are two industries on the
south side of the river. But more importantly there is Dresden Nuclear Power Plant
and related spent fuel rod storage here. They haven't shipped anything out in years
but the tracks are still in with crossings paved over. Dan

dt8089 Wrote:
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> It is a branch. The end of one to be exact.
> There are two industries on the
> south side of the river. But more importantly
> there is Dresden Nuclear Power Plant
> and related spent fuel rod storage here. They
> haven't shipped anything out in years
> but the tracks are still in with crossings paved
> over. Dan

I can't help finding it funny how these things work. Countless bridges with heavy traffic are a century old, and a complicated bridge like this gets replaced on a branchline.

<<<<<<help from the government the Ex EJ&E now CN
Bridge 552 near Dresden Lock and Dam on the Illinois river>>>>>>>

Doesn't this make the project a communist, socialist, Kenyan, terrorist plot?

Looks like a waste of money, there appears to be only one active shipper beyond the bridge and rail links to nuclear and oil burning power plants. I can't figure out the oil burning plant, as there are coal cars parked outside the gate, and a maze of tracks into a empty field south of the plant. Looks at one time it may have been coal fired, but hard to tell. Anyways it would have been a lot easier to just rebuild the former line south to the ATSF connection.

http://mapper.acme.com/?ll=41.39516,-88.29754&amp;z=18&amp;t=S

Ted Curphey
Ontario, OR

funnelfan Wrote:
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> Looks like a waste of money, there appears to be
> only one active shipper beyond the bridge and rail
> links to nuclear and oil burning power plants. I
> can't figure out the oil burning plant, as there
> are coal cars parked outside the gate, and a maze
> of tracks into a empty field south of the plant.
> Looks at one time it may have been coal fired, but
> hard to tell. Anyways it would have been a lot
> easier to just rebuild the former line south to
> the ATSF connection.
>
> http://mapper.acme.com/?ll=41.39516,-88.29754&amp;z=18
> &t=S


At one time the line ran to South Wilmington crossing the
Santa Fe at Coal City. The power plant with the hoppers is
the old Collins Station. It was a oil fired peaker plant
later converted to natural gas. ComEd tried to get it licensed
to burn coal but Grundy County protested and wouldn't give them
tax incentives for the conversion. Would have created 200 jobs
for the local economy. The tracks leading into the now disassembled
facility are used for storage of company owned hoppers. There is
a lot of land ripe for industrial development in this area and it
may be why the CN is holding on to it. Dan

I used to play on that bridge all the time when I was kid.
The replaced bridge dates back to the early 20th century and the Army Corps just modified it to be a lift bridge - probably to save money - prior to opening the river to traffic in 1932. That is why the barge passage was so narrow.
Be assured they are going to use it to carry nuke waste by rail to Yucca Mountain. Big money.