Tunkhannock viaduct

My most recent issue of Trains Magazine, November 2006, has a giant treatment of reinforced concrete in railroad structures, which I suppose was somewhat revolutionary, coming as it did at the beginning of the twentieth century.
It points out the mighty Tunkhannock viaduct, in Nicholson, Pa., is the grandest reinforced concrete structure of them all. It was built by Delaware, Lackawanna & Western railroad as part of a giant relocation project in 1912-1915.
Tunkhannock viaduct still stands (Tunkhannock viaduct) — it would take a direct hit from a hydrogen bomb to remove it. And it is still used, I think by Canadian Pacific and Norfolk Southern (trackage-rights) to access Scranton and its northeastern Pennsylvania anthracite fields.
Or else it’s owned by Delaware & Hudson, if it still exists, and CP has trackage-rights — or it may be the other way around (or CP bought D&H).
Whatever; the Lackawanna was a much easier railroad to operate than the original D&H out of Scranton, which crossed Ararat Mountain.
When DL&W tanked, their line north out of Scranton became the D&H main, and Tunkhannock viaduct was saved. The Ararat line was abandoned.
Jack and I visited Tunkhannock during our motorbike trip to the mighty Curve and Steamtown (Steamtown). I predict a noisy fusillade of strident bellowing.
We arrived at Steamtown an hour early, despite my losing Jack in deepest, darkest Scranton. He was taking the signed route to Steamtown down the congested main drag. I had been to Steamtown before, so was taking a side-street with little congestion.
I had instructed Jack to follow me, but nobody tells Jack what to do. He went his own way, getting to Steamtown long after me. (“Hey, where ya been? How come I always get places first?”)
Since we had an hour to kill, Jack wanted to find Tunkhannock. I was leery because I wanted to get into Steamtown when they opened to guarantee tickets for a steam-excursion which was at 11.
I didn’t want to be wandering all over the wilderness searching for a place I’d never been; not after our wandering search for the elusive Italian restaurant the previous night.
Our maps made Nicholson fairly easy to find, so noisy-mouth prevailed, and off we went out Route 6 towards Clark’s Summit.
Route 6 was fairly congested, but not too bad. Then it spilled onto an open rural highway. The road to Nicholson, Route 11, was three-lane up a long hill.
It came back down the hill, and suddenly there it was.
“Holy Sh__!” I exclaimed. The grand daddy of them all. The track is 240 feet above the creek-bed; although only one track remains — it’s built for two, and originally had two.
It leaps the entire Tunkhannock valley, 2,375 feet, way more than Ben Franklin (Ben Franklin bridge), although Ben Franklin has to be open-span to clear ships. (Ben Franklin was opened in 1926.)
Tunkhannock can put footprints in the valley (in fact, a lot of the structure is underground — the footings go to bedrock). But stand under an archway and it’s huge.
To think that this was built with private capital; not Eisenhower but Truesdale — an effort to make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear.
Before Truesdale, the DL&W was a tiny podunk railroad swamped by northern Pennsylvania coal.
Before the viaduct DL&W descended into that valley and climbed back out.
Tunkhannock is a stop on the rail-pilgrimage; right up there with Starrucca (Starrucca viaduct), which Jack and I also saw.
But compared to Tunkhannock, Starrucca was a waste. You have to remember Starrucca was built in 1848 (the Curve [Horseshoe Curve] opened in 1854); and that as such it’s an engineering landmark.