Eastern Railroad Discussion > Tunkhannock Viaduct Lost Part of its "C"

Two of my sons and I took a ride from Northern NJ to Binghamton on Sunday to see some trains, but that was a bust.

On our return to Scranton I noticed part of the "C" has now fallen off the famous ex-Lackawanna Railroad, Tunkhannock Viaduct in Nicholson, PA.    Just a grab shot by stopping on the side of the road.

CV the civil E in NJ

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Part of the "K" is gone too.

sscannella Wrote:
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> Part of the "K" is gone too.

That has been gone for quite some time.  But the "C" is recent.  It's probably still laying on the ground somewhere right where it fell.  I wonder what the letters are made of?

Those letters were no doubt applied when all the construction scaffolding was still in place.  It would be quite a project just to repair the "K" and the "C" now.

Now we have drones! LOL

Even with the "lack" of a complete c anbd k, it remains impressive.  Part of the C and K were missing in September 2006..

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I would think the other remaining letters are in need of repair / rehab too.   I doubt NS, the current owner, would spend the dollars for the work.

Also looking at some of the construction drawings of the bridge, those letters are about 5-6' in height as the thickness of the concrete at the bottom of the arch is 8'.



Topfuel Wrote:
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> sscannella Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > Part of the "K" is gone too.
>
> That has been gone for quite some time.  But the
> "C" is recent.  It's probably still laying on the
> ground somewhere right where it fell.  I wonder
> what the letters are made of?
>
> Those letters were no doubt applied when all the
> construction scaffolding was still in place.  It
> would be quite a project just to repair the "K"
> and the "C" now.

cjvrr Wrote:
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> I would think the other remaining letters are in
> need of repair / rehab too.   I doubt NS, the
> current owner, would spend the dollars for the
> work.
>
> Also looking at some of the construction drawings
> of the bridge, those letters are about 5-6' in
> height as the thickness of the concrete at the
> bottom of the arch is 8'.

Hey, I know!  Someone could hire a Los Angeles "graffiti artist" to scale that bridge and spray paint the missing letters back into place.  How in the world those vandals manage to climb all of our freeway interchange bridges that are 4, 5, and 6 stories up and vandalize places that normal people could only access with cranes, scaffolds, etc is beyond me.  

Back in November, 1989 I was doing some research on this viaduct's construction. Mr. William Shank of the American Canal & Transportation Center in York, PA provided me with this photo of the viaduct's northern most arch being built. I might add that during the construction of this viaduct, only two workers fell to their death. Also no one drowned in the concrete. The fresh concrete's consistency and a heavy concentration of reinforcing rods, some measuring two inches in diameter, would have prevented such an accident from happening.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/17/23 16:40 by Pattenburg.

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Replacement should be electronic, so as to allow updates to corporate ownership/ corporate name changes.  Since the original casting:

Lackawanna, DLW
Erie Lackawanna
Conrail
Delaware & Hudson
Canadian Pacific
Norfolk Southern

That's six owners, four of them in the last 45 years.  Kinda like naming rights for sports stadiums. Who can keep up?  Who wants to?
 

As you can see in your photo, there a lot of deterioration to the parapets.

Ray

If I would have designed that bridge, I would have molded the letters in the forms, eiither negative or positive.

Victor Biard

Impressive  for  sure. What is  the  age??

Opened November 1915