20190402 StJoe basement dug, slow intermodal

On my way to vote, I noticed the crossing signal was flashing for a long time with no train on the road. I wondered if it was another false closing. No, it is more proof that the signals installed in 2014 are still dumb enough to go down as though the approaching train is going 70mph, the track speed for passenger trains. Then when I saw how slow an intermodal train was going on The Racetrack, I shot a short video to record the speed. The track speed for freight is 45mph. And intermodals are supposed to be BNSF's fastest freights. Since this video is short, I decided to experiment with including a video directly in the blog rather than use YouTube.

I stepped into StJoe's parking lot to get a clear shot of the construction of the addition through the gate.

From the sidewalk, you can see where they have put safety tape along the hole dug for the basement of the addition.

2:26:16 I took this photo to get a timestamp of when the intermodal train finally cleared the road. It took over three minutes for it to pass through town. As you can see, it backed up traffic north of Franklin.

They put a barrier up indicating that you are not supposed to go up that grass to get a better shot. Fortunately, I can read the model number of the Cat through the fence: 314E L CR. Note the big dirt pile behind the gravel pile.

2:27:50 Another "get a timestamp" shot because the gates are going down. It was a commuter, so no more shots of that train.

2:45 I voted and I'm walking East on Warren. A crossing gate bell started ringing, so I stood at the parking lot for Community Bank of Downers Grove to wait to see what is coming. It is an eastbound commuter, and it is still going pretty fast considering that it needs to come to a stop pretty soon. Although, looking at a map, it does have four more blocks to go.

You have to take two photos of a commuter to record direction because the engine is always on the west end. The car on the east end of the train has special controls for the engineer to drive eastbound trains. It is called a cab car. The building behind the the train is called Burlington Junction, and it is finally done. I checked Google Maps, the bank building that was torn down to make room for these apartments still appears on the satellite image.

There was a gap in the traffic, so I quickly took another view of the school construction.

The gap continued, so I more carefully framed the construction activity.

Again, the safety tape outlines where the hole has been dug.

20170711 Our Driveway, Hy-Rail gets off at Forest

(If you are new to this blog, please start at the beginning and follow the "next" link at the bottom of each post.)

Today they started work on the replacement of our driveway.

 I can remember when men would hold a jackhammer powered by a big, noisy air compressor. Skid steers and hydraulics has made demolition a lot easier job.

 In the meantime, other workers unload supplies to build the forms.

 And pieces of the driveway are...

 ...dumped into a dump truck parked on the street. Fortunately, Main Street got a second lane in each direction a few decades ago.

 A view of the torn up driveway from a side window.

 And from a basement window.

 This video is not worth uploading.

Now they are working on the concrete layer. You get a good view of the hydraulic hoses that power the jackhammer.

 The grass between the old driveway and the sidewalk, as well as the sidewalk, is also being replaced.

It does look like there was not very much gravel under the old concrete. They have to remove enough dirt that they have 5" for stone+sand and 5" for concrete.

10:07  Final view in the morning before I went to the basement to work on my blog.

2:18  While crossing the tracks on the way to check out the construction sites, I noticed there was something different looking approaching on M2.

 And a BNSF truck parked by the signal box means something is up.

I stepped behind the gates because the bells started clanging. I had determined that what was coming on M2 was a rail truck.

Looking West, M1 and M3 have a green, but M2 doesn't. M3 is normally used for westbound traffic. But the three tracks of the Racetrack are signaled so that each track can run trains in either direction.

And this would be an example of why each track is bidirectional. There is probably an outbound (westbound) commuter on M1 so the Amtrak train is on M3 to go around the commuter and the truck traffic.

 The rail truck is approaching Main Street.

Note that as he approaches Forest, the worker that had already arrived on the scene has triggered the gates to lower.

 And then the rail truck stops as soon as his rear wheels are also on the road. The driver gets out.

 It occurred to me that he was going to raise his rail trucks and get on the road at Forest. So I switched to a video: "I had noticed a small BNSF tool truck parked by the signal control box when I crossed Forest Avenue. In the distance, I saw a rail-truck on M2. So I stuck around to see what was going to happen. Rail-trucks travel slowly because they don't have enough axles to trigger the crossing gates. They have to wait until traffic clears in both directions to cross a street. The pickup truck was there so that a worker could manually lower the crossing gates so the truck could stop on the road. After they switched the truck from rail to road by raising the rail trucks, the gates were opened so that the truck could go on Forest. But the cars and people started going as soon as the gates went back up. So the BNSF worker went into the street to signal the cars to stop so that the truck could turn onto Forest and leave."

I walked down to Gilbert to checkout the Forest site.

Not much was happening, so I took just a couple of status pictures. They have already asphaulted the parts of the road they cut up to bury pipes.

The sewer subcontractor is working at the M&M site today.

The video was 1:11 of the excavator working. But I trimmed both ends to show just the maneuver I have seen excavators do when they want to turn in place.

I walked further south to get a view from the corner of Main and Maple. This view reveals that a smaller excavator is also working on the site.

Now I have walked east along Maple to get a view of the steel reinforced retaining wall and the poured concrete foundation wall.

I was on the south side of Maple because it still has a sidewalk. While I was there, I got a picture of the adjacent condo building that is still doing finish work. I heard that some people did back out of their agreement to buy a condo unit when they saw that their view would no longer be over a nice old home and mature trees. On subsequent visits, I walked along the fence on those rather big rocks that they have back filled with. It is a bit of a challenge to walk on big, loose rocks.

On my way back home, I pass a dump truck that is hauling away part of our driveway.

Fortunately, our neighbors house did not have a tenant in July so the driveway contractor could park in their driveway.

2:59  They have the forms done, have added the stone, and are now adding the sand.

5:00  Putting the finishing touches on the sand.

5:46  Some shots of the day's work.

I see they have added the rebar as well.

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20170710 Sewer Pipe

(If you are new to this blog, please start at the beginning and follow the "next" link at the bottom of each post.)

10:39:36  This is the second day Gilbert is closed so that they can install a sewer pipe for the building under the road. We see Donegal tool and dump trucks. Donegal is the sewer subcontractor.

It is common for contractors to haul the dirt out and then backfill with stone.

Notice the layer of brick to the left of the man on the left. Some of Downers Grove's streets still have the bricks exposed. That is, they have not been covered with asphalt.

The trench we saw them dig across the road was to the left (West) of this area.

A closeup of their tool truck.

Here we see plates and gravel back fill for yesterday's trench in the foreground and the excavating they are doing today in the background.

And they are laying some drain pipes under the floor.

I think rain was predicted for Monday, so the M&M site declared a rain day. Fortunately for the sewer subcontractor, the weathermen were wrong again. There was not a drop of rain that day.

The village has allowed the M&M site to use the parking spots on the street and to close the sidewalk.

10:55:58  I'm documenting a false gate closure. Note the gates are going up, traffic is backed up, and I didn't take any pictures of engines going by. It has now been years since they installed the new signals and they still don't work correctly. During almost four decades of living here with the old gates, I never saw a false gate closure!

Checking back at the Forest site.

It is Monday, a work day, so other sub contractors, e.g. Abbey Concrete, are on site.

We used to have a joke at work, does the person doing the work do it faster if more people are watching? (In fact, I made more keyboard mistakes if people were watching. I let the technician who helped me do the keyboarding if there was a crowd watching because the pressure did not bother him. (A crowd would be watching us only because something is very wrong. These men are watching because only one person can work in the hole.)

The problem with burying drain pipes is that you can't see any changes.

2:45:22  Why do the freights come through town after I have walked past Prairie and can barely see them?

There were several engines on this one.

2:45:26  And it was an eastbound intermodal.

Even though digital is cheap, I was not going to waste anymore disk space on such tiny images.

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