Percival Island
While I was in Lynchburg, I got a chance to check out the Percival Island nature trail. I knew the bridge that crossed onto the island in the middle of the James river was an old railroad bridge but I did not know why you would need a railroad bridge to an island.The first thing I noticed crossing the bridge was that it was double track, and the actual bridge structure itself didn't look that old. As a matter of fact, it looked like it was in better shape than a few of the bridges I have crossed on a train. I stopped at the viewing area over the bridge to check out the scenery and look a little closer at the bridge before I headed over to the island.
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| Railroad bridge going to Percival Island |
As soon as I stepped off of the bridge I saw signal foundations, again old, but not that old. These foundations looked like the same ones we are pulling out now as we refresh the signal system. As I wandered around the island I found a lot of things, old pole line, old ties and old rail. I checked the tie plates for dates but couldn't find any. Again, none of this stuff seemed that particularly old so that got me thinking, what was this place and what was it used for?
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| Signal foundations along the jogging trail |
Now, if I had read the historical sign on the way over, I would have known that Percival Island was a rail yard and was operated by Norfolk and Western until 1964. 1964 does not seem that old to me, I know people that can remember 1964. So either I am getting old (nahhh) or this place operated well into the modern age.
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| An old tie laying next to a trail |
I wanted to check out the Holcomb Rock Dam that someone posted in the comments but it seemed like it rained everyday I was coming to or from work. It is on my list of things to check out.
Mini Foamers
In the past few weeks I have learned an interesting thing about human nature, obsessions are born, not made. One day while working at the Concord Rd crossing we noticed a car sitting in the parking lot, it sat there for an hour and left only to return and park on the opposite side of the road. There was an elderly lady driving and a boy of 7 or 8 in the back seat. A train came by and the boy held up his camera and started taking pictures. Ahh a mini foamer. I like most kids so I grabbed an extra vest and took it over to him and he showed me all of the pictures on his camera. He had Amtrak, NS and CSX pictures and I have to say, some of them were pretty good.
I also spent a little time with a friend of mine in Richmond and her 4 year old son. That boy knows more about trains than half the railroaders I know. As we were riding around running errands it was my job to hang out with the little man and keep him occupied while his mom ran into the stores.
No problem, I have train pictures on my phone. I showed him a yard engine, "Oh that one doesn't have a lot of horsepower", I showed him a big road engine "A diesel engine", I showed him a picture of the Greenbrier Express "wow a big steam engine" He could also tell me the difference between gondolas, box cars and coal cars. Keep in mind, he is Four! After I ran out of pictures, I grabbed a video off of the Old Dominion Railfan page and he was mesmerized. Dennis Shafer made this video of a NS train coming out of a tunnel and he loved it! He watched it over and over until we got back home.
I thought of myself as a horse obsessed little girl, no one knows where I got that particular fascination from, but I have had it as long as I can remember. I guess these kids are no different, they love trains and all of the things that go with it. I am sure in the future you will be seeing pictures and videos from both of these boys and they might even be better than yours.
Injury Time Out
I had surgery on my shoulder last week and will be out for the next 8 weeks so I have been doing a little extra writing for my friends over at Workhands. Workhands is like LinkedIn for the skilled trades so I wrote a post for them about the signal trade. Just click here to read it.
Since I will be laid up, if anyone has any suggestions, questions or places I should check out let me know. I should be able to drive in the next week or two and I will have a little bit of time on my hands.
