Re: (erielack) New Jersey West Line (2)

[Charles_Walsh_@_Berlex.com]

Rich,

I remember the Block Line article on the Caldwell Branch, back in the days
when the Block Line was a first-rate publication.  I've been past Verona
park during the last year and the deep cut just west of the park (across
Pleasant Valley Way) seems to have been excavated to some extent, so that
if you didn't know where to look for it you probably would never find it.
I've never explored the east side of the park to see what's there, if in
fact anything remains.  The eastern portal of the tunnel, which is off of
Upper Mountain Avenue, would have required a significant grade leading up
to the tunnel from the downtown area and the connector off of the Greenwood
Lake Branch (now the Boonton Line).  I was always curious as to where the
western portal was going to be.  Given the topography of the area, I
presume that it might have been slightly west of the Bloomfield Avenue-Rt.
23 intersection, but that's a guess.  By the way, the Block Line, if I
recall correctly, mentioned that there were two reasons why the tunnel
project was abandoned: the first was the Panic of 1873; the second was that
the tunnel itself kept collapsing and that it is doubtful that the project
itself could have been successful because of the logistics of boring
through that area.  The idea of the line, of course, was to create a
competitor to the DL&W through Morristown.  The question I've always
wondered was had the Erie accomplished this, then what?  Was Morristown to
be the end of the line?  A question to ponder.

Chuck



                                                                                                                                 
                      "Rich Behrendt"                                                                                            
                      <rbehrendt_@_columbus                                                                                        
                      .rr.com>            To:     "Jim Guthrie" <jguthrie_@_pipeline.com>                                          
                      Sent by:                    "Erie Lackawanna List" <erielack_@_lists.railfan.net>                            
                      erielack-owner_@_list cc:                                                                                    
                      s.elhts.org         Subject:                                                                               
                                                  Re: (erielack) New Jersey West Line (2)                                        
                                                                                                                                 
                      02/28/2006 08:58 PM                                                                                        
                      Please respond to                                                                                          
                      "Rich Behrendt"                                                                                            
                                                                                                                                 
                                                                                                                                 



It's interesting that the Caldwell Branch is shown cutting through First
Mountain between Verona and Montclair via a proposed tunnel.

The line as it left Caldwell e/b, followed Bloomfield Avenue, but where it
ducks under Bloomfield Ave. to go north towards Cedar Grove, was proposed
to
go straight east , paralleling just south of Bloomfield Avenue through
Verona, and would have spanned through Verona Park - In the wintertime in
the 1970's you could still see some of where this proposed line had been
graded intially through some of the neighboroods, but never completed,
including the approaches on either side of Verona Park

Tri-State's Block Line did an intensive complete article on the history and

operation of Caldwell Branch in the early 1980's, including this proposed
alignment and the tunnel through into Montclair - the tunnel had just been
started on the Montclair side when the line was abandoned for what
eventually became the Caldwell branch via Cedar Grove and Overbrook - I
remember hiking back there in the late 1970's to see the remnants of the
tunnel - If not filled in and/or build on, there's probably nothing there
today...

One wonders if this alignment had come to be, whether the line would be in
place today...

Rich Behrendt
ELHS #384
- ----- Original Message -----
From: "Jim Guthrie" <jguthrie_@_pipeline.com>
To: "Erie Lackawanna List" <erielack_@_lists.railfan.net>
Sent: Tuesday, February 28, 2006 11:02 AM
Subject: (erielack) New Jersey West Line


>A few weeks ago, there was  some discussion of the NJ West Line in
relation
>to the P&D.
>
> There's a large and optimistic Essex and Hudson County map now on the NJ
> Midland site which pretty clearly shows the route.
>
> http://njmidland.railfan.net/essex.jpg
>
> Not only is it optimistic regarding the NJW, but also the route of the
> Caldwell Branch from the Montclair Rwy.
>
> I scanned it large enough you can zero in on detail so it's slow loading,

> but the 1870 map is well worth a look
>
> There's other neat stuff, like aqueducts, the Morris Canal and more . . .
>
> Cheers,
> Jim Guthrie
>
>
>
>
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