Alpine Tunnel: The Problem of Clearance, part 2

Restricting the brakemens’ work was only one of the many problems caused by the tight clearances of Alpine Tunnel.  Sometimes equipment simply didn’t fit, like when the rotary snowplow had to go through the tunnel during the winter of 1904-1905.  A number of inches had to be cut off some timbers just to get it through when westbound.  On the way back eastward, three inches needed to be cut off the already cut timbers to get the machine through again.  Owing to this hatchet work, a telegram was later sent from Alpine Tunnel station to report that some of these timbers were now moving inward.  

Rotary just outside of the east portal
(from Historic Alpine Tunnel)

New timbers were sent shortly after the above telegram, but within several months of the repairs, four timbers were found to be “kicking in.”  In September of 1906 the Bridges & Buildings foreman inspected the tunnel and noted that “conditions grow worse as the mountain crowds the timbers.”  He recommended certain sections of timbers to be removed and reinstalled farther back in the wall to widen the tunnel.

Rotaries were not the only pieces of rolling stock with difficulties in the tunnel either.  In November of 1907 a gondola, whose sides had bowed out a foot, scraped on the sides of the tunnel timbers.  An additional problem was the buildup of ice on the timbers.  As the ice accumulated, it stuck out and cars ground into these while traveling through the bore.

Gondola 4319, the only known surviving C&S gondola, on display in Central City (Tim Bain photo). The car is now excellently restored in Como

The Alpine Tunnel, like the famous ocean liner Titanic, is a curious study in a glorious venture that went wrong.  How the great Alpine Tunnel project went wrong still fascinates many, and to the list of problems that brought this ‘ship’ down, must be added, clearance.  It may not be as epic as the Goliath-sized snow drifts that buried the line, but clearance and moving timbers were a continual battering in the hull of the tunnel that helped bring the bore down in the end.

Below is an interview with George Champion who piloted the last rotary through Alpine Tunnel in 1910.