Railroad Tunnels and Bridges

Pictured above are the Central New England bridge at Poughkeepsie, the Livingston Avenue bridge in Albany, and the Maiden Lane bridge in Albany.

Our feature articles are about New York City subway tunnels and railroad tunnels under water .

We cover some specific bridges and tunnels, such as New Haven Railroad bridges along the Shore Line , the the Great Railroad Bridge at Poughkeepsie , the historic Old Colony railroad tunnel, The Hudson River Bridge Company at Albany was a part of the New York Central Railroad , and Montreal’s Mount Royal Tunnel .

Included are stories on Staten Island Bridge .

Delaware & Hudson Railroad bridge removals

abandoned tunnels in New York State , and the Hudson Tubes .

See our story on the New York State Thruway bridge collapse .

We have some interesting material on bridge tolls .

Lot’s of good pictures, like a wooden trestle near Millbrook, New York .

Be sure to see our bridge and tunnel reference section .

Livingston Avenue Bridge (picture at middle) (sometimes referred to as the freight bridge or North Bridge) was built by The New York Central Railroad to carry freight trains over the Hudson. Passenger trains came across to the station on the Maiden Lane Bridge (South Bridge) (picture at bottom) .
This bridge is gone and Amtrak uses the Livingston Avenue bridge now.

These two bridges were owned by a separate corporation:
HUDSON RIVER BRIDGE COMPANY AT ALBANY (THE)
The two railroad bridges crossing the Hudson River between Rensselaer and Albany were owned nominally by a separate organization called The Hudson River Bridge Company at Albany, incorporated April 9, 1856. This ownership was vested in The New York Central and Hudson River Railroad Company, three-fourths, and the Boston and Albany Railroad Company, one-fourth. Except for foot passengers, the bridges were used exclusively for railroad purposes. The north bridge was opened in 1866, and the south bridge in 1872.

Back in the early 1900s, the Central found that traffic was growing beyond the capacity of West Albany Yard (which was geographically constrained from expanding), and that West Albany Hill had a tremendous detrimental effect on freight movements. With trains growing in length and weight, many needed helpers or even doubling to get up the grade. The result was the Castleton Cutoff (and the newest of the Hudson River bridges in the Albany Area)

Construction of the Livingston Avenue Bridge over the Hudson River, which today connects Amtrak’s New York City trains with western New York,

began when Abraham Lincoln was president.

The Livingston Avenue Bridge stands as a working monument to steam-age rail thinking in the Empire State. The 144-year-old swing bridge is the sole link for Amtrak passenger trains crossing the Hudson River. Between trains, a 230-foot draw section still pivots open and closed on a turntable mechanism some 100 or more times each year so big boats can cruise through. As passenger rail advocates push for development of modern high-speed tracks and trains that would move at speeds of 110 mph or more, the daily reliance on this relic of 19th-century technology carries great irony. If the bridge were to be out of commission for an extended period, Amtrak’s alternate route across the Hudson for trains traveling out of New York City would be another CSX bridge across the Castleton viaduct. This route would miss stops at Rensselaer and Schenectady. Rensselaer Rail Station was Amtrak’s 10th-busiest in the country last year, with nearly 724,000 boardings and arrivals.

http://www.ominousweather.com/EDI/images/MaidenLaneLivingston.jpg

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