treerootCO
Rising Sun Member
- Joined
- Aug 22, 2005
- Messages
- 5,422
I thought they gave up!!
treerootCO said:I read it in the Colorado Association of 4wd club letter/newspaper.
I rode my motorcycle through it the DAY before it collapsed on the Denver firefighter and was closed. eeek! As far as it reopening, I heard that too but have nothing substantive on it. So Red Chili has no clue.subzali said:I rode my bike up there last fall but was getting a little tired and cold by the time I got up to needles eye. I was going to walk up to it but then it looked like it was too far. That would be cool to connect it over to WP, as long as the mud bogs don't get worse there next to Yankee Doodle Lake.
DUDE IM WITH HIMRed_Chili said:Being a railroad nut in general and a fan of the Moffat Road Hill Route in particular I would have to strongly disagree with you fellers. The tunnel is an historical artifact. I would grieve deeply if it were gone. I have photographs of 200 ton (!!!) standard gauge articulated locomotives angling through that tunnel and clinging to the side of the cliff just past the turn of the century, an AWESOME sight. David Moffat, out of capital and getting poor fast (from being one of the richest Coloradans in his time), had to locate his railroad over the top in order to get to the ranches and coal fields west, and produce revenue. Incredible determination. We could use some o' dat.
The loss of the tunnel is one of the reasons some folks have opposed reopening it, because to avoid danger and lawsuits while remaining cheap, 'daylighting' it was the preferred solution. I would oppose it under those conditions too. But from what I hear, daylighting the tunnel is not what is being planned now! Geeee, both sides win, who'd a-thunk it?
By the way, if you've never visited the trestles just west of Needle's Eye, they are a treat. They hang on a talus slide area known as The Devil's Slide- with good reason. It would have been terrifying to ride a standard gauge railroad over those trestles.
Just west of those is a loop, bridge and tunnel known as Riflesight Notch, where one of those 200 ton steam locomotives learned to fly at about 60 mph they figure. Number 210, a 2-6-6-0 American Locomotive Works Mallet, lost a side rod, took out its brake compressor, and became airborne, flying over a train below it before hitting the forest floor and exploding. There are still pieces of it in the woods, though most ended up in folks' living rooms.
The engineer, fireman and brakeman jumped out at 10 mph when the siderod broke loose. They did the calculations fairly rapidly and chose a different mode of transportation.