Re-gauging 3000 miles of track in a weekend

[Paul_D_North_Jr]

Having 'feet' and extensive experience in each of the track engineering, surveying, and legal communities, perhaps I can add a few helpful comments (in no particular order - they're related in a couple of different ways): 

• Any "monument" - i.e., a more-or-less fixed-to-the-ground object that is intended to or might be able to serve as a property line or corner marker, or as a known distance reference to such a property line or corner (even a monument that might have moved a little bit, such as a track, a highway centerline, a meandering stream, etc.) is better than no monument at all.  I believe every hierarchy or ranking of the types of evidence to be used in construing/ interpreting documents and property lines gives the highest priority to intended man-made monuments that are found intact, over any conflicting distances, bearings, calls for abutting owners, maps, deeds, etc., and other types of evidence.   
• Even if Norm's oak tree had still been there - then where exactly is the middle of a leaning tree that might be 3 ft. in diameter ?  More common is ascertaining the centerline of a treeline or tree row, or a piled stone fencerow, or a small stream.  Often, it comes down to a field judgment that "It looks like it's about here".    
• The true task and question is almost always not "Where should I locate the property line ?", but instead: "Where did those old guys intend to locate the property line ?".  These kinds of surveys are called "retracements" - to follow in their footsteps and lines, not to establish new ones.  Even new technology and better measuring equipment is not a justification for moving the old line; if they were using crude equipment and imprecise methods, their results should be honored and confirmed, even if we could do better today.       
• One practical (though unintended) "monument" that often works well is the centerline of a bridge, especially its "back walls" (end walls or retaining walls) of stone or concrete (not the timber ones so much).  They were usually constructed very accurately per special structural plans for each one, tied-in well to the right-of-way and centerline geometry, and were changed only rarely when destroyed or reconstructed.
• The 'eternal challenge' in surveying is to reduce the uncertainty (lack of precision and/ or accuracy, as the case may be) as much as possible.  Like perfection, it's rarely achieved, but the true professionals keep trying, within the limits of the client's needs and budget.  A practitioner has to be comfortable with a certain amount of uncertainty, ambiguity, illogical and inconsistent facts, rules, and decisions - otherwise, you'll drive yourself crazy with "What if ???".  Then again, there are times to keep looking . . . and a good surveyor has "the experience and wisdom to know the difference" ! (adapted from the "Serenity Prayer").  What you don't want to have happen is to have another surveyor come along later and find something that you could have - and should have -  found and relied upon to retrace the property lines and corners.    
• Even in the old transit-and-steel tape days, surveyors routinely achieved precisions and accuracy in the 0.01 ft. range = 1/8 inch, and 1 unit in 10,000 (about 1 foot in 2 miles, or about 0.01 ft. in 100 ft.).  This is usually far more accurate and precise than most natural monuments and some man-made ones (big pipes, truck axles, etc.).  The modern equipment isn't much more usefully precise than that - much faster and easier, yes, but not much 'better' - and maddeningly, is occasionally or often less precise (i.e., GPS).   
• Keep in mind that unlike most other engineering (or other) professions, there isn't any 'margin of error', 'factor of safety', or 'for good measure' in surveying.  There's only a fixed quantity of land, so it's a "zero-sum game", and moving any line to 'be sure' or giving one owner his full measure of land necessarily takes that amount of land from the other owner. 
• Once again, I refer those interested to Robert A. Le Massena's excellent essay: 

"Selected railroad reading: Numbers - Accuracy beyond the decimal point"

by LeMassena, Robert A., from Trains, July 1982, pgs. 44 - 45. 

- Paul North.  

[ChuckCobleigh]

mudchicken

...Too many folks can't tell you the difference between accuracy and precision, but there they are - out pretending to be surveyors and boundary lawyers

Had a discussion on that very topic once with a lawyer.  Bright fellow, or so he thought.  Couldn't get him to understand the difference.  Finally gave up.  "Give it up.  He doesn't get it.  He'll never get it.  The cows know more about the difference between accuracy and precision than he ever will."

On the subject of precision, a bit off-topic, I have been amused by "experts" in court trials (accident "reconstructionists" specifically) who can estimate speed to within a thousandth of a mile per hour, mainly because that was the number they got off their canned Excel spreadsheet, probably.  Nothing says "I don't know what I am talking about" any louder than that.

[mudchicken]

Falcon - you may not like the fact that track centerline is considered to be a monument, but its better than a fenceline or some crummy metes and bounds description as alluded to above. Properly used, they are great evidence and why surveyors nationwide are soooooo frustrated with abandonment regulation in relation to preservation of monumentation. If you try to tell me section corners (PLSS system) don't move, I'm gonna fall down and LMAO. In the same vein, curve track centerline centerline rarely if ever is centerline of the R/W. Too many folks can't tell you the difference between accuracy and precision, but there they are - out pretending to be surveyors and boundary lawyers. Surveyors are out there walking in the footsteps of their predecessors -it's a lot more difficult than the button pushers/ coordinate jockeys and dimestore lawyers will ever comprehend. Plus there is the human equation....and nobody EVER knows it all, learn something new every day. 

[mudchicken]

Murphy Siding

     mudchicken- How do you find the center line of re gauged tracks?  Archaeological dig?

Photographs, railroad records, newspaper accounts, AFE notes, museum collections......other surveyors notes.....dig up the evidence and see what it tells you....(Why I volunteer my time to the few railroad collections that do more than just store the shiny toy playthings)

ALL Photos - DPL Western History Collection/ Richardson & others

http://digital.denverlibrary.org/cdm/ 

[Norm48327]

Falcon,

In a previous life I did land title for a living. Lucky me got the metes and bounds descriptions. Some were downright ridiculous. They would start at a designated Oak Tree and proceed from there. Needless to say, by the time I was doing that title said tree was long since reduced to firewood. Fortunately, Michigan was surveyed in township form and section markers became the normal starting point.

[Falcon48]

Murphy Siding

mudchicken

Lineovers are well documented in Prof. Hilton's American Narrow Gage book (usually smaller distances) which also describes the railcar incompatibility problem. Those railroads were also kicking-in longer ties to help stabilize the gage swap.

The problem in the present day for most of us mudchickens is which rail moved and when? (The center of track no longer being center of the R/W by some 10 1/2 inches....sometimes, if they had the time or were dual gage for a while), they swapped sides which causes major brain damage trying to re-create. Documenting this stuff can be really tough. (witness the standard gaging of the broad gage Erie)

(and then you get the oddball 4 rail lines thrown in there on occasion just to keep you on your toes and trolley lines converted to interstate commerce freight lines)

  Why the concern over where the center line is? Does it have to do with who owns a 2-1/2" strip of real estate?

 One of the problems that often come up  is that local surveyors use the centerline of an existing track as a measuring point for determining property boundaries in real estate conveyances (for example, a property description may be a "mete's and bounds" description with one of the starting points being "32 feet south from the center line of the track of the XYZ railroad").  The property involved in these transactions may not involve the right-of-way property at all - it may be nearby property.  

In doing so, the surveyors are making the unspoken (and unwarranted) assumption that the rail track is a permanent monument and will always be in the same place.  In fact, over time, railroad track can move quite a bit.  Obviously, a major project like re-gauging or intentional re-alignment will do that.  But even ordinary track maintenance can result in location changes which move the track centerline by several inches.  The cumulative effect of changes like this over time can be significant and easily exceed the margin of error considered acceptable in a property survey. 

[Murphy Siding]

     mudchicken- How do you find the center line of re gauged tracks?  Archaeological dig?

[mudchicken]

The effect was most obvious in multiple track or siding areas. The standard 12 or 13 foot track centers of the day were more like 15 ft. plus on Erie and they wisely mimicked that in new construction after re-gaging happened. Clearances were not much of a problem on an Erie line.

[tree68]

Murphy Siding

 3-1/2" wider makes makes curves more sweeping?  You'd think for most people, it would be hard for the eyes to pick out that difference.

Erie was six foot.  Taking that down to current gauge is more like 15 1/2".  They still managed to get in some pretty tight curves, like the one in Hancock, NY, which is tight even by today's standards.

[Murphy Siding]

tree68

mudchicken

seppburgh2

Didn't the Erie do a gauge change from 5 foot to standard?

Six foot

And many parts of their ROW that are still in use reflect that.  Wide bridges and sweeping curves.

 3-1/2" wider makes makes curves more sweeping?  You'd think for most people, it would be hard for the eyes to pick out that difference.

[tree68]

mudchicken

seppburgh2

Didn't the Erie do a gauge change from 5 foot to standard?

Six foot

And many parts of their ROW that are still in use reflect that.  Wide bridges and sweeping curves.

[blue streak 1]

mudchicken

Just because the center of track moved does not mean the R/W lines moved with it. (or worse yet, when the original main track is picked up and only the second main track remains, or worse than that, consolidations of two main tracks where they go back and forth between tracks, swapping sides in curves and other such fun stuff - serious brain damage for the boundary surveyor... have had serious problems with that issue all over the country. (dealing with a pair of those now back east of you))

MC here is one about AAF that sounds as an example although the report is big on fluff and small on facts.

 

http://www.wptv.com/news/region-indian-river-county/vero-beach/all-aboard-florida-could-impact-mans-pet-business-in-vero-beach

[mudchicken]

seppburgh2

Didn't the Erie do a gauge change from 5 foot to standard?

Six foot

[seppburgh2]

Didn't the Erie do a gauge change from 5 foot to standard?

[mudchicken]

Murphy: The original centerline often describes the offset distance to the boundary line in a legal/property description. surveyors are tasked with collecting all the evidence they can find to evaluate and decide where a boundary line should be. When government public lands survey lines cross a railroad at a skew angle, life gets pretty interesting. (I have a railroad client that now owns a strip mall because of some of the follies of assumptions about railroad boundaries compounded by no evidence of a proper survey on the tract the strip mall was built on - the strip mall is about to be bulldozed... and a title company is in deep doo-doo on top of it as it tries to weasel out of paying a claim to the mall owner who bought a title policy.)  Usually the problem is more akin to what we see in urban areas where the developer/ architect builds right up to the boundary line and it turns out to be the WRONG line.

Just because the center of track moved does not mean the R/W lines moved with it. (or worse yet, when the original main track is picked up and only the second main track remains, or worse than that, consolidations of two main tracks where they go back and forth between tracks, swapping sides in curves and other such fun stuff - serious brain damage for the boundary surveyor... have had serious problems with that issue all over the country. (dealing with a pair of those now back east of you))

(with apologies to Chad, the peanut gallery is quite a hoot to observe some of this from)

[Firelock76]

An amazing feat, any way you look at it.  Those guys knew how to WORK.

[Murphy Siding]

mudchicken

Lineovers are well documented in Prof. Hilton's American Narrow Gage book (usually smaller distances) which also describes the railcar incompatibility problem. Those railroads were also kicking-in longer ties to help stabilize the gage swap.

The problem in the present day for most of us mudchickens is which rail moved and when? (The center of track no longer being center of the R/W by some 10 1/2 inches....sometimes, if they had the time or were dual gage for a while), they swapped sides which causes major brain damage trying to re-create. Documenting this stuff can be really tough. (witness the standard gaging of the broad gage Erie)

(and then you get the oddball 4 rail lines thrown in there on occasion just to keep you on your toes and trolley lines converted to interstate commerce freight lines)

  Why the concern over where the center line is? Does it have to do with who owns a 2-1/2" strip of real estate?

[mudchicken]

Lineovers are well documented in Prof. Hilton's American Narrow Gage book (usually smaller distances) which also describes the railcar incompatibility problem. Those railroads were also kicking-in longer ties to help stabilize the gage swap.

The problem in the present day for most of us mudchickens is which rail moved and when? (The center of track no longer being center of the R/W by some 10 1/2 inches....sometimes, if they had the time or were dual gage for a while), they swapped sides which causes major brain damage trying to re-create. Documenting this stuff can be really tough. (witness the standard gaging of the broad gage Erie)

(and then you get the oddball 4 rail lines thrown in there on occasion just to keep you on your toes and trolley lines converted to interstate commerce freight lines)

[dknelson]

What a remarkable achievement in logistics that was -- in an era of no radios or telephones.  

I assume that many, if not all, of the turnouts in that era were stub switches ("bending the iron") which I would think would make the re-gauging effort far easier than if the turnouts used moving points as today's do.  

 

Dave Nelson

[samfp1943]

Murphy Siding

    Recently I ran across something in a book that said 3000 miles of track was re-gauged in a weekend, in order to conform to 4'-8-1/2" to conform to connecting roads.  I thought the time frame was somewhere in the 1880's(?).  Was that even possible to do in a weekend, even if you had 1000's of workers lined up?

Norris;   A reference, I remembered similarly was in : 

Main Line of Mid-America: The Story of The Illinois Central Railroad 

Carlton J. Corliss, Creative Age Press, 1950.

This was specifically aimed at the re-gauging of the lines of the Illinois Central RR between the  Cairo,Il. area,and New Orleans... accomplished in one day on May of 1886... I think it was done by moving only one rail inward to the correct gauge of 4' 81/2" .

Also, [ IIRC ] in this same time frame of Post Civil War ( 1885-6 ?) The other Southern Railroads were regauged, but they did it with some sort of a mechanical 'fix' utilizing the wheels and axles..They had mostly been but to a gauge of 5'... I do not recall all the details of that change. 

[M636C]

The English Great Western Railway converted from 7'0-1/4" to standard gauge over a similar short period in 1892. Much of the track at the Eastern (London) end of the line was already dual gauge, since the GWR operated standard gauge trains to the North West.

However, in Devon and Cornwall much of the main line was broad gauge only. There was an advantage in that Brunel's track used longitudinal "sleepers" as they are called in England, and since they didn't link the rails, the name "ties" seems inappropriate. The gauge was held by iron tie rods which  could be cut  and shortened to allow the rails to be moved together. Photos of long rows of obsolete broad gauge locomotives in store at Swindon are well known as symbols of the change. Most of the older locomotives could not be converted given the large change in the gauge. A number of locomotives had been built for conversion from the 1880s onward and some of these are seen in the photos. Many of these had inside frames as broad gauge engines but outside frames as standard gauge engines. All of them had only inside cylinders on both gauges.

M636C

[CSSHEGEWISCH]

By comparison, it might be interesting to find out how Indian Railways has been accomplishing its re-gauging project.  Many of the meter-gauge lines have been or will be converted to broad gauge.

[rcdrye]

PNWRMNM

I think the bigger job was regauging all the equipment, but I have not seen anything about that project

Most of the rolling stock was handled by simply lifting the carbodies off the trucks and sliding replacement trucks underneath.  Freight car trucks could be quickly rebuilt with replacement bolsters and wheelsets to be reused on other cars.

Standard guage locomotives were already on hand.  Some of the 5'  locomotives could be regauged by replacing driving tires with wider ones (recall the "Russian" decapods), though most required more rebuilding, or were simply retired.

[Rader Sidetrack]

The link is to a 1966 edition of Ties, published by the Southern Railway System, (now part of NS).

http://southern.railfan.net/ties/1966/66-8/gauge.html

Of course, there was lots of work to do before the big push started, but essentially the change was made in 3 days.

Finally, in the early morning hours of May 31, the concentrated work began. Men worked in crews of various sizes charged with various goats-some given specific mileages to cover, others under instructions to begin at a specified point and work in a specified direction until they met another crew working toward them.

Along thousands of miles of track-approximately half of which was operated by predecessors of today's Southern Railway System-spikes were pulled, rails moved in to the new gauge, and more spikes hammered into place. At shops and rendezvous points throughout the South, motive power and rolling stock were being altered to fit the new gauge. Wheels of cars were moved in, steam engine brakes and tires were altered-and the screeching of axles being narrowed on lathes joined the ringing of heavy hammers.

In less than three days, standard-gauge trains were serving the South. "The work was done economically ," an article in the Journal of the Association of Engineering Societies pointed out, "and so quietly that the public hardly realized it was in progress. To the casual observer it was an every-day transaction. It was, however, a work of great magnitude, requiring much thought and mechanical ability. That it was ably handled is evidenced by the uniform success attained, the prompt changing at the agreed time, and the trifling inconvenience to the public."

http://southern.railfan.net/ties/1966/66-8/gauge.html

[PNWRMNM]

Possible and done. The key to it was picking one rail (east or west) to shift systemwide, then setting the new inside spikes ahead of time. On the day pull old inside spike, line the rail over and spike the new outside spike. About half the switches could be dealt with by shifting only one rail, the others had to move frog in addition. Probably did sidings, but may have left yard tracks for the next day.

I think the bigger job was regauging all the equipment, but I have not seen anything about that project.

Mac McCulloch

[Murphy Siding]

    Recently I ran across something in a book that said 3000 miles of track was re-gauged in a weekend, in order to conform to 4'-8-1/2" to conform to connecting roads.  I thought the time frame was somewhere in the 1880's(?).  Was that even possible to do in a weekend, even if you had 1000's of workers lined up?