I was doing some scouting of a business that I will include in my layout, and we ran across another spur that we had never seen before. It seems to be a place of unloading hoppers, but We did not get a great look at it. If anyone can tell me what it is that would be great, I might want to include it on my layout
"Ann Arbor 2373 Calling... Milkshake. Over"
AllAboardAmtrak:Northbound, Southbound, and My Hometown
Norm wrote:Looking at it on Bing it appears to be possibly a truck repair shop or Ann Arbor DPW. Zoom in on it and rotate counterclockwise for a good view.
Norm nailed it, Ann Arbor DPW. It may have been something else once upon a time (coal dealer).
With your modelers license it can be set up on a layout to receive salt (150-250 cars per year, that's how much salt the city of AA uses per winter) and aggregate (perhaps limestone from Alpena?).
PatC created a monster, 'cause nobody wants to see Don Simon no more they want AARR I'm chopped liver, well if you want AARR this is what I'll give ya, bad humor mixed with irrelevant info that'll make you roll your eyes quicker than a ~Z~ banhammer...
Norm wrote:Looking at it on Bing it appears to be possibly a truck repair shop or Ann Arbor DPW. Zoom in on it and rotate counterclockwise for a good view.
Norm nailed it, Ann Arbor DPW. It may have been something else once upon a time (coal dealer).
With your modelers license it can be set up on a layout to receive salt (150-250 cars per year, that's how much salt the city of AA uses per winter) and aggregate (perhaps limestone from Alpena?).
Maybe even a mix of sand and salt for the salt trucks.. lots of ideas to be played with
"Ann Arbor 2373 Calling... Milkshake. Over"
AllAboardAmtrak:Northbound, Southbound, and My Hometown
YpsiAmtrakBoy wrote:Maybe even a mix of sand and salt for the salt trucks.. lots of ideas to be played with
A progressive city like Ann Arbor would be just the kind of place to use sand instead of salt. They usually use "spent sand" from foundries. One year the spent sand from the Ford engine plant in Cleveland was shipped to Cadillac and used on the roads up there during the winter instead of salt. The irony was it was the same sand mined from Yuma, shipped by rail to the same engine plant for engine molds, then shipped by rail back to its origin
PatC created a monster, 'cause nobody wants to see Don Simon no more they want AARR I'm chopped liver, well if you want AARR this is what I'll give ya, bad humor mixed with irrelevant info that'll make you roll your eyes quicker than a ~Z~ banhammer...
Thats a neat little area, I was just over there a few weeks ago and looked around. My guess was that the elevated spur was for the city or county for unloading stone for municipal projects. Maybe there was a powerplant there farther back. Also noticed remnants of a switch for a siding on the north side of Felch going south. The buildings on the south side of Felch look as if they were arranged around a third siding. There's also the brick building between the elevated spur and Felch, it looked like it had a siding at some point but I didn't see any evidence of a siding...it may have been accessed by a switchback from the south side of Felch. Thought I saw some rail in the ground along the building, but it was hard to see over there through the fence and scrub trees and brush. Great spot to model, especially with that steep grade.
The AARRT&HA has mapped out the tracks in Ann Arbor during various eras. You are right, Ben, there used to be quite a few tracks in that area. I would have to look up the industries that occupied the sidings.
PatC created a monster, 'cause nobody wants to see Don Simon no more they want AARR I'm chopped liver, well if you want AARR this is what I'll give ya, bad humor mixed with irrelevant info that'll make you roll your eyes quicker than a ~Z~ banhammer...
Probably be a scratch build to get the right look for your AA site, but doesn't look overly complicated to do.
Walthers has one that is pretty close (coal trestle is in background).
Other companies have their own version. I will have the Walthers kit on my AARR Ann Arbor layout
PatC created a monster, 'cause nobody wants to see Don Simon no more they want AARR I'm chopped liver, well if you want AARR this is what I'll give ya, bad humor mixed with irrelevant info that'll make you roll your eyes quicker than a ~Z~ banhammer...
Almost every city / county / village that had to maintain their roads had some sort of rail siding to unload sand and gravel. They would also receive telephone poles and pipe. Anything that could be brought in bulk would arrive by rail, cheaper by the car load. I am not saying what this one was or was not (?) just my 2 cents.
Railroads were an integral part of road building in MI. At the turn of the century roads were dirt trails and didn't connect towns. RR saw that good roads to the towns would bring them more business so they worked with the govt's to build better roads. At that time the gov't was either the incorporated towns or townships.
MDOT and Road Commissions did not exist. MDOT was organized in 1905, the Road Commissions were begun after that up to the late teens. MDOT worked with RC's on State Reward Roads. The RR's brought in the sand, gravel and barreled cement for the road construction. The materials were delivered to the nearest town. Contractors built narrow gauge RR's to haul the 3 materials to the road grade where the concrete was mixed on site.
As the road network expanded and the trucks got better, it became feasible to get the sand and gravel from nearby pits and truck it to the job sites. Cement still continued to be delivered by rail.
The Kent County Road Commission had 7 garages around the county by the early 30's. 4 had RR sidings, the main garage in GR served by the PM and GTW, the Ada garage in Ada on the GTW, the Caledonia Garage in Caledonia on the MC and the Cedar Springs garage on the PRR. Any deliveries to the others (Rockford, Sparta, and Wyoming) were to the nearest team track.
The deliveries were road tar, bagged calcium chloride for dust control and an occasional wood box culvert. Wood box culverts fell out of favor and road tar was trucked in as the road network to Whiting IN improved. The improved road network allowed liquid calcium to be trucked from Ludington and the use of tank trucks to spread eliminated the hand unloading of box cars and hand loading the spreader truck. The trucked in tar and bitumen made the bituminous road cheaper and concrete roads fell out of favor until the later 50's and the I system. By then cement was being shipped in bulk by truck.
The last load delivered to the Kent County Road Commission to it's own siding was a load of Douglas fir to Ada for the rebuilding of the Ada Covered Bridge in the early 80's. The last loads for Kent County were a couple loads of liquid calcium chloride with rust inhibitor in the mid 90's. Dow in Ludington could not load trucks with the product so it was railed to the St Mary's Cement siding and the RC transloaded the product there.
My father-in-law has told me stories of working summers delivering coal that was delivered by rail car to a trestle somewhere in the Grand Rapids area. He said they usually had 24 - 48 hours to get the car unloaded and get the coal loaded into a truck to homeowners who had coal-fired home heating systems.
