I've been on a kind of staycation with my wife in the hills on the outskirts of Hillsboro, Oregon. We were getting cabin fever where we live due to 'social isolation', and decided to rent a place for a couple weeks out in the country. It was a great decision. Not only was it close to work, it was also such a peaceful and beautiful place to wander around. On one of my walks, I stumbled upon a piece of railroad history, the Holcomb Creek Trestle.
The Holcomb Creek Trestle was originally built in 1905 by United Railways. [src] It is a timber pile-driven trestle, 1,168 feet in length and approximately 90 feet tall. It is thought to be the highest and longest still-used wooden train trestle in the U.S. [src]
It is a timber stringer bridge which spans over Holcomb Creek and Dick Road on the Portland and Western Railroad. [src]
From a distance I noticed a huge wooden structure on my first walk, but at the time I had no idea what it was.
After crossing under it, I got this shot of the trestle. At that point I decided to see if I could find out what it was on Google Maps.
As you can see from this Google map, the trestle is about ten miles outside of Portland, Oregon. It's really a good idea to be at least ten miles from there.
A view of the trestle from the northern side a little up the hill.
A view from the southern side. There is a log of vegetation growing close to the trestle, making it vulnerable to a possible fire. In 2015, a 50-foot high and 600-foot long trestle near Sherwood, Oregon caught fire, destroying an 85-year-year old piece of history.[src] It would be a shame if this particular one suffered the same fate.
In some of the photos you can see the cross-bases are broken. Since traffic still traverses this trestle, it must have been determined they were non-essential. There was a $600k proposal to repair the trestle back in 2011, but it is unclear whether or not it was approved.[src]
You can see from this angle where the trestle connects to the hillside. I saw some people up there walking a few feet onto it, but they didn't go very far. This was probably a smart choice since this trestle is still actively being used.
This a view directly upward from the road. This looks to be the highest point, meaning the tracks would be 90-feet up from this spot. Some brave soul climbed fairly high to paint a graffiti skull.
A view of the tracks directly skyward. The sun was fairly high in the sky at the time I was there, causing harsh shadows and glare. Rumor has it the trestle is haunted, and that several people have hanged themselves from its lofty timbers. [src]
Here is a panoramic view stitched together using the AI of my phone. There is no curvature in the actual trestle.
Continuing up the hill, there are a number of picturesque farms and homesteads.
There was even a tiny log cabin, which appeared to be a guest house attached to a much larger estate.
I saw this majestic oak and and treehouse came to mind.
I later strolled down a dead end road which ended in this vista. You can see the Holcomb Creek Trestle partially obscured by some bushes. It took about thirty seconds before I learned I was standing on private property, but the owner was friendly enough once I politely introduced myself.
Coming back down a road parallel to the one the trestle crossed, I came upon the train tracks. I was tempted to follow them to the trestle itself, but instead decided to obey the sign.
As an added bonus, I'd like to introduce you to my new best friend Farley. He's the friendliest and hippest horse I've ever met. I mean, check out the braid!
I hope you enjoyed my #wednesdaywalk, and thanks or reading!
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Posted from my blog with SteemPress : https://joshman.com/wednesday-walk-stumbling-upon-the-holcomb-creek-trestle
Wow! What an impressive bit of engineering this appears to be @joshman. Can you imagine what it took to calculate all of those angles and the loads that needed to be supported by them? I wonder what the engineers think today about taking their trains across it, if there are cross timbers which are broken? 🤔😳
The photos you took were very good to get all of those details in. With the "plan" in place, on paper, the next thing I can imagine is what it took to be on the construction crew putting all of these bits and pieces together!
Great part of the country to make it out of wood. I wonder if any particular effort was made to get "just right" trees to cut down for the needed timbers?
Thanks for sharing this with us!
P.S. Yep, agreed. Being at least 10 miles away from Portland seems like a wise choice to me. 👍
From their angle, I doubt they know. Still, someone must have looked at it and determined they were non-essential.
Some of the vertical timbers are very girthy, I'm thinking they douglas fir.
I found this interesting article:
https://www.thevintagenews.com/2016/11/09/the-magnificent-and-mighty-trestle-bridges-of-the-19th-century/
Here's a company that sells reclaimed trestle wood:
https://www.trestlewood.com/pageview/1020/trestlewood-story
Wow! Great links, my friend. Had a bit of time to read through them quickly @joshman. Engineering indeed! I wonder how many of these were built, when you consider the importance of railroads for generations? Especially amazing were the curved ones, adding the "difficulty level" considerably, I would imagine. The surveyors must have been top-notch people.
I drove under an interesting one, as shown in one of my "Road to Recovery" posts, but it was in the dead of winter. I personally love these remote stretches of highway, but there was a trestle bridge! I parked down under it, for a bit, an just imagined trains rolling through the panhandle of Idaho, hauling out timber from the largest White Pine stand on earth ...
As for the trestle wood for sale, did you read the source of it? Love these bits of history ... Another engineering marvel, the Lucin Cutoff, as the Southern Railroad was determined to avoid the original transcontinental route up around the north end of the Great Salt Lake. I grew up around that area, so well familiar with it.
Particularly interesting to read about their challenges to drive piles to support this massive bridge. Can you imagine a "rebound" of 2 to 3 feet, when a 3,200 lb. "hammer" drove a pile into what must've been sold rock? Or what about into the "bottomless pit" on the bed of the Great Salt Lake?
Being the engineering wizards they appear to have been, what would they have expected to be "down there?" 🤷♂
It's crazy what humans are capable of!
Do the trains still use that trestle?
Largest one still in use in the US. Heard a train go by about 5:30 this morning.
Pretty cool. Although, feels a bit unsafe at the same time.
I wonder what it's like being on the train when it passes through such a narrow track, or whether you wouldn't notice 🤔. It's a remarkable structure though!
Fancy pinning on Pinmapple yo share with more people 😊
Oh, I totally forgot. Been so long since I did a travel post!
no worries, I scout around all the time to pick up travel posts !
Every day I'm trestling.
Beautiful engineering.
That map has a lot of familiar place names, copy and paste maps of the new world, I guess. Vancouver confused me for a few minutes because I was thinking what happened to Washington?
Ha,yeah.. so many places around with similar names. It's amazing how much we relied on wood for structures such as this.
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I love that trestle, it reminds me of western movies where trains brought gold miners. I hope they restore it.
Definitely, it's a relic from a bygone era. Amazing it's still being used.
Isn't this bridge very popular for video games, movies, song clips and so on? I remember seeing one very similar (or this one) in some racing games. Maybe I'm making a confusion :D
No idea, maybe! If you stumble upon it somewhere, let me know :)
If this trestle is still actively used, am wondering why the proposal is still yet to be approved for it
It is, but it's also a historic one, so they can't make any changes to it. Most likely they will just shut it down and declare it a landmark.
Greetings friend @joshman I hope you are well, like your family.
Thanks buddy, same to you!
Nice place man! I am counting day to get to Pacific North West :)
Hive northwest meetup?
possible... haven't booked the car yet.. that reminds me..
#posh
https://twitter.com/joshman/status/1268408142402027521
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Lovely. I used to live in Seattle in the early/mid 90's. You're gonna mislead people with all that blue sky haha. I've been to a few wonderful places in Oregon. A very diverse state indeed socially and geographically. Nice shots and who doesn't love train history?