MethuenRailTrail » methuen Rail Trail

Fresh trash behind Village Mall

admin — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 14:57:28 +0000

Apparently someone at the Village Mall decided it was easier to toss their bags of leaves over the hill onto the trail. These are from the last 2 months or so; they were not there before that. Tim Vermette has been getting out there quite regularly to clean and this kind of thing is disheartening.

ed. The owners of the Village Mall are looking into the clean-up crew who did this.

Tribune – Behind the Headlines Podcast interview

admin — Wed, 29 Apr 2009 16:49:03 +0000

Methuen trail would connect Lawrence with New Hampshire

I got over to the Eagle Tribune offices the other day and gave an interview with Noah R. Bombard the Multimedia editor. Noah did a fine job of cleaning it up so I sounded knowledgeable.
Thanks Noah!

Industrial waste

admin — Wed, 01 Apr 2009 16:59:06 +0000

industrialwasteoutside5corners2, originally uploaded by jgodsey.

Today I got a good look at the section of tracks I have been avoiding. Years of casual disposal of industrial and business waste are built up along the embankments everywhere from the back of Granite Ave apartments up through the end of Pine St. The actual ‘wild’ areas are pretty clean by comparison. The sections that abut businesses and homes are the ones most fouled but dumping. topical and individual garbage elements can be removed by hand, but the serious industrial waste will have to be removed with a backhoe and trucked out by dump truck. It is much too dangerous to be handled by humans.

Rails at the Gas line cut

admin — Fri, 27 Mar 2009 17:03:51 +0000

gas line cut, originally uploaded by jgodsey.

I got a big kick out of this. When the gas line was put in 10 years ago, they cut out just the width of the gas line trench which is much shorter than one track section. Then they put back the cut pieces of track with new ties and brand new gravel. The old ties are piled up next to the section. At the time the track had been unused for over 15 years and would never be used again, but they did go so far as to put it back like the found it.

Rail Trail Then and Now

admin — Wed, 11 Mar 2009 17:07:10 +0000

I was rooting around in my photos and came up with this one tagged: Methuen Rail Bed 2001: taken from the MSPCA dirt road which bisects the railbed. I matched it up from the series I shot last summer(2008), Clearly the shrubbery is making headway. Luckily the area north of the downtown area has fewer Saplings in the rail bed; it is mostly this low growth and invasive species. Areas south of the Wild Life Sanctuary have many more small trees guarding the tunnels and intersections. I wonder if we can find any older images of the trail.

Thawing again

admin — Sun, 08 Mar 2009 17:07:47 +0000

the great thaw

admin — Sat, 28 Feb 2009 17:09:35 +0000

yippee… another couple of days and all the snow will be gone, but then we have a little mud. . .

Methuen’s Bailey Bridge

admin — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 17:12:59 +0000

This isn’t exactly trail related but relatively interesting since it’s NEAR the trail. I was very excited to see our first section of bridging on Rt 28, as it is a Bailey bridge. (excuse the blurry image)

Bailey bridges are a portable prefabricated bridge with a fits anywhere modular design. It was developed during WWII by an engineer in the British War office. The elements are small enough to be carried in trucks, and the bridge is strong enough to carry tanks. The portable Bailey provided an excellent solution to the problem of German and Italian armies destroying bridges as they retreated. By the end of the war, the US Fifth Army and British 8th Army had built over 3,000 Bailey bridges in Sicily and Italy alone. If you have ever seen a Bridge Too Far, there is a depiction of a Bailey bridge being built.

It is a very clever and economical design, that can also be seen further up river in Lowell. Kudos to whomever signed off on the choice.

a Beautiful Day on the Trail

admin — Mon, 02 Feb 2009 17:15:26 +0000

I went out for a short walk, the trail is still a little crunchy and I am sure a good rain will turn it into some lovely mud for us. But all and all very picturesque.

Methuen Rail Trail poster

admin — Tue, 18 Nov 2008 21:50:02 +0000

This is an 11″ x 17″ color poster to download and put up.

Download pdf here..large hi res file (2.5mb) - it prints up nicely though.

I have been printing them at Fedex/Kinko’s for about $1.50 each.

So far we have one at Stop and Shop, Thwaites, the Safety Building, and the Nevins Library (well I left it, I don’t know where they put it.)

Let me know any other places you think will take such a poster.

Thanks