Streetcars in Brunswick

[Benjamin Richards]

Locals are aware of the Frank Wood bridge replacement in Brunswick/Topsham.

Yesterday I noticed a crew excavating the road on the Brunswick side of the new bridge. In the hole were two parallel rusty strips of steel. I immediately suspected streetcar tracks. A bit of internet research today confirmed that while most of the Lewiston-Brunswick-Bath trolley line was ripped up for scrap during the Second World War, the tracks on the bridge itself and the approaches were simply paved over, being set in concrete and therefore too difficult to remove. The trolley and the bridge only coexisted for 5 years, the bridge having been constructed in 1932, and the trolley ceasing operations in 1937.

A pile of rail appeared late yesterday. To my uncalibrated eyeball it looked like perhaps 85 lb rail. Further reading suggests it is in fact only 70 lb rail.

The most remarkable aspect for me is just how far down the tracks were. I would guess 18 to 24 inches. That is a lot of layers of asphalt!

[Mike Fox]

Interesting find. There are many towns and cities in Maine with the same thing hidden in their streets..

[Carl G. Soderstrom]

Those layers with uneven removal were one reason for the I35 bridge collapse here in

Minnesota.

[James Patten]

18 or so years ago road crews were tearing up Union St in Augusta, near its intersection with Rt 27/State St (the intersection is where the entrance to the Capitol complex is).  They encountered tracks from the Lewiston, Augusta & Waterville street railway.  I don't recall seeing any maps of the LA&W having a branch on Union St, so I wondered if it was some kind of stub to get trolleys out of the way.

[Bruce Wilson]

James, could that stub track have been a freight spur? Maybe a coal delivery track to the Capitol boiler house?

[James Patten]

Could have been a freight spur.  Where the Capitol is on the other (west) side of the street, I doubt a boiler house would have been on the east side.  There may have been other government buildings down Union that would take coal. 

[Dave Crow]

In the days before single-ended streetcars, many lines just ended as a stub; streetcars would "change ends" - the motorman would swap poles (if a two-pole car) or swing the pole on a single-pole car to the other end of the car to head back the way it came.  Another possibility could have been a stub to hold extra cars for afternoon rush hour or as a layover during special, high-capacity events.