The Rock Creek Hiker-Biker Trail near Ray's Meadow Local Park and Jones Mill Road will experience intermittent closures Monday, April 15, through Thursday, May 2, while the Purple Line Project completes demolition of the train trestle and bridge. pic.twitter.com/FbDKYst2XE
— Montgomery Parks (@MontgomeryParks) April 15, 2019
Category Archives: Georgetown Branch related links
East Side of Rock Creek Trestle is No More
Greg C. visited the Rock Creek site this past Tuesday morning and witnessed the missing wooden trestle. It’s gone! :'( This marks the end of an era, the bridge having stood since 1892 has finally gone down. A new pair of bridges will replace this one, carrying the Purple Line rapid transit and the Capital Crescent Trail across the valley at about half the height of the original trestle. RIP.
A photo from the Friends of Forest Glen Facebook group shows the demolition in progress. If only I could have gotten up there to measure those timbers. :'(
Rock Creek Trestle Demolition Progress
View is west, standing on the northern side of the right of way. The Creek and the trestle are behind the crane. Sadness.
B&O Valuation Maps Going Online
The National Archives has started posting their collection of valuation maps online. Right now, not everything is live, but more is sure to come. Visit the collection of B&O materials here: https://catalog.archives.gov/id/1180861
I was unable to find anything Georgetown Branch related at this time, but I will be checking back and will update this post when I do. Could you find anything interesting on there? I hope so! The collection really is fantastic.
UPDATE: It’s Jan 14th, 2020 and I revisited the National Archives collection to see if there are any new images. I found two:
Valuation Section 24.1, Sheet 1
Published June 30, 1918. This covers Georgetown Jct. to Connecticut Ave. There is a ton of new info on this map! No sidings at the junction, sidings at Rock Creek Bridge (at each end) and a lot of detail at Chevy Chase! Wow!
Valuation Section 24.1
Published May, 1938. Also covers the area around Georgetown Jct. Not sure about this map. It shows a much wider perspective and has some markings near Silver Spring, probably regarding land ownership.
Here’s hoping they publish more in the future. Let me know if you see any!
Rock Creek Trestle Demolition Date Set
The bell is tolling for the Rock Creek trestle. The Purple Line has announced that beginning on March 26, demolition will begin as they remove the path across the top and then begin demolishing the trestle itself. Already the wood planking atop the trestle is being removed.
I am hoping to visit the site to witness some of the demolition. It’s heartbreaking to read about. RIP.
UPDATE:
Photos from Feb 7, 2015 GB Exploration
A bit of housekeeping: I’ve added a large set of photos from an exploration trip I did with Kelly R. on the GB back in 2015 to my Gallery. These photos were previously up on my Flickr page only but now you can view them in my Gallery. Enjoy!
Link here
Video: Georgetown in 1932
This newsreel footage has some really neat, yet very brief shots of Georgetown taken from the Memorial Bridge. You have to look hard, but you get a few really cool views of the dusty, smoky, dirty section of town off in the distance. Awesome find!
B&O S2 9023 in Bethesda ca 1964
This photo had to have been taken around 1964, as I believe the Air Rights building (visible under construction in the distance) was completed in 1966. S2 9023 was built between 1943-48. I’m not sure of its original three digit number. The B&O Freight Station is visible to the left of the cab and the engine is sitting on the main, just past Bethesda Ave. I stumbled on this photo while looking at the B&O Diesel Roster on North East Rails. Photo by Bud Laws.
Oct, 1921: Concrete Magazine Article About Rosslyn Steel & Cement
While searching for documents, I stumbled on this article from Concrete magazine, published in October 1921 and scanned by Google. The Rosslyn Steel & Cement Co. property has always been of interest to me, as it was served by the B&O in Georgetown. There was a siding that came off the B&O’s Water St. tracks and curved into the RS&C property, past the large concrete cement elevator and into their massive steel fabrication facility. A quite large and long shed housed the steel operation where they produced re-bar and other steel assemblies for use in their construction projects.
The special thing about this article is that it shows very detailed plans for the RS&C plant and a couple wonderful photographs! They also detail the operations of the cement elevator and the mechanical function of the loaders and unloaders. Really neat stuff! These images and the article text finally give a detailed look at how this plant appeared and was laid out on the site. I’m planning on modeling at least part of it, if I can figure out how to fit it into my layout.
Film of DC Transit at Dalecarlia
This neat video showing various railfan excursions from the 1950s to 1970s in the DC area shows a wide variety of subjects, including a brief, rare color film shot of the trolley approaching its crossing of the B&O’s Georgetown Branch, which crossed the trolley tracks on a deck girder bridge. The trolley last ran to Glen Echo on Jan 3, 1960 and the area beneath the bridge would be filled in later that year. (I walked the line back in 1991 and witnessed this deck girder bridge sitting only a few feet off the ground. It was a strange sight.)
Video begins at the 5:54 mark and is only a few seconds long, but it’s neat to see. In the background you can see the GB bridge crossing over the tracks. There was a second deck girder bridge to the left which extended the crossing.