BEEM - Carter-Roag Coal Company ALCo S-4 number 115, Palace Valley, West Virginia upper bridge_
The Beech Mountain road crew with a second cut of loaded coal hoppers starts across what is called the "Upper Sub" crossing of the Left Fork of the Buckhannon River at Palace Valley. The BEEM has two such bridges that are built to withstand raging mountain stream floodwaters. The sloped concrete structures are designed to allow high water and debris to flow over top of the rails.
Track was first laid through here in the last years of the 1800s to haul timber to market. In true logging railroad fashion the right of ways were crude and hastily built. In some cases the track was laid right across the shallow river beds and just relaid if washed away during floods. However more permanent solutions were sought after an engineer was scalded to death when his steam locomotive overturned into high water. Filled in culverts with pipes became the remedy and they were dubbed "submarine crossings." They eventually evolved into what you see here. Two of these crossings remain, this one about MP 5.5, and another, appropriately known as the "Lower Sub", a mile down stream.
BEEM - Carter-Roag Coal Company ALCo S-4 number 115, Palace Valley, West Virginia upper bridge_
The Beech Mountain road crew with a second cut of loaded coal hoppers starts across what is called the "Upper Sub" crossing of the Left Fork of the Buckhannon River at Palace Valley. The BEEM has two such bridges that are built to withstand raging mountain stream floodwaters. The sloped concrete structures are designed to allow high water and debris to flow over top of the rails.
Track was first laid through here in the last years of the 1800s to haul timber to market. In true logging railroad fashion the right of ways were crude and hastily built. In some cases the track was laid right across the shallow river beds and just relaid if washed away during floods. However more permanent solutions were sought after an engineer was scalded to death when his steam locomotive overturned into high water. Filled in culverts with pipes became the remedy and they were dubbed "submarine crossings." They eventually evolved into what you see here. Two of these crossings remain, this one about MP 5.5, and another, appropriately known as the "Lower Sub", a mile down stream.