April showers bring May flowers - or so the saying goes - but when those showers continue through May, June and into July... they bring a lot of work to the railroad. On the morning of July 1st, yet another thunderstorm came through the area. Curiously the wind was blowing out of the North, as opposed to coming from the Southwest like normal. We got a lot of rain in a short amount of time, and the ground was still saturated from the rainy summer we have been experiencing. When I was able to check the railroad out the next day, I found this tree across the track at Redbud:
The Oak tree was over one and a half foot diameter, and as you can see in the picture, the trunk landed directly on the track. Once the tree was cut off at the edge of the right-of-way, the remainder of the stump was rolled off the track... and there was very little damage. The rail wasn't even bent. Very surprising.
Even though the tree didn't really hurt the railroad, the rain did. Redbud has had some flooding issues over the years, and every time I've made changes in an attempt to avoid future flooding issues. And invariably, it isn't enough. To be fair, the flood damage was a lot less severe than in the past, but it was widespread. The turntable wasn't actually damaged; mainly just muddy and the footing for the ring rail next to the creek had settled again. The bridge across the creek had significant erosion around the north footing. Both the mainline and siding needed to be reballasted due to the flood waters breaching the right-of-way - the two culverts under the tracks just couldn't carry the water away fast enough.
With that in mind, I decided to do some more downsizing to the railroad. The turntable and bridge across the creek were removed from Redbud, and both the mainline and siding were removed back to walkway crossing. The undersized culverts were removed, with the remaining trench dredged and left open. The old mainline now ends at the trench. The siding was installed up to the creek, but does not cross it. It was raised quite a bit over the trench and a small bridge was installed. I'm actually looking forward to the next torrential downpour to see if the changes will work:
This picture was taken from the water tower. The track on the right is the old mainline. The other track is the siding - you can see the bridge over the new trench in the foreground, and the missing turntable and bridge at the creek in the background.
I have always intended for the N&F to represent a depression era shortline through the Ozarks. However, last year's decision to downsize the trackplan had inspired thoughts of changing the railway so it would represent a logging railroad instead. That didn't happen last year - at that time it made sense to keep the turntable and wye since they were already there - but this summer's flood repairs made it feasible. Plans were made to relocate the Redbud turntable to Cedar Flats. The wye will be removed and the tail track switch relocated for the new turntable siding. As of this time, the switch, turntable and most of the siding is in place, hopefully it will be finished by the end of the week:
Cedar Flats is almost the lowest part of the railroad and is about halfway through the curves, so it was the natural place for the turntable. Trains will now back out of Northview all the way down to Cedar Flats, where they will stop and the locomotive will be turned. The train will then be pushed up to Redbud with the engine at the back of the train. After switching at Redbud (did I mention the plan to relocate Brown's Sawmill to Redbud?) the train will back down to Cedar Flats, the locomotive turned, and then it will continue up to Northview. One thing this will accomplish is that the boiler will always be pointed uphill; an important consideration for logging railroads, although our grades aren't so steep as to make it necessary. Another thing this accomplishes is roughly equalizing the amount of left and right curves that the locomotive will negotiate so the flanges wear evenly on both sides. The cars will be turned end for end once a year for the same reason. Finally, the amount of track will be reduced considerably while still keeping possibilities for interesting operation... less maintenance, more fun!
So, how will it all turn out? We will find out when I make the next post...
