4 ms·

What would make this super interesting to me would be a historical timeline and a way to contribute historical routes. For example, here are some old branches

What would make this super interesting to me would be a historical timeline and a way to contribute historical routes. For example, here are some old branches off the main San Francisco Peninsula line: • Hawthorne Avenue in Palo Alto (three blocks north of University) and Middlefield where it crosses San Francisquito Creek were originally a spur line that served the Catholic University (now Jesuit Seminary) in Menlo Park. • What is now Fry's Electronics in Palo Alto and that row of buildings had loading docks in the back for the spur that branched off the main line there. This line went to where the Veterans' Hospital is now and then followed the path of Foothill Blvd, straight through the Trader Joe's parking lot at Homestead ends, then continued through to tracks that still exist on the other side of 280. • If you ever wondered why Camden Avenue in Campbell/San Jose has that oddly smooth curve where it veers off Hillsdale, yes, it was another train line. This was the Campbell-Almaden line (thus the name cam-den) which started from the still-existing line that runs through Campbell (you can see some of the old loading docks from Railway Avenue). Where Camden bends right at Kooser, the train line continued straight through where the power lines are now, crossed a bridge to follow what is now Redmond Avenue in south San Jose, and on to the town of New Almaden.

ucaetano 9y ago
This might interest you: https://drive.google.com/open?id=1AzVOviQ2o0fJQtwONbVHk7M3TBs&usp=sharing https://drive.google.com/open?id=1AzVOviQ2o0fJQtwONbVHk7M3TB...
femto 9y ago
Just what your ordered? http://www.openhistoricalmap.org/ http://www.openhistoricalmap.org/ http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Open_Historical_Map http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Open_Historical_Map Given that it is all based on the OSM database, I'd imagine OpenHistoricalMap would already cover historical railways? There is a renderer for the "railway" aspect of the OSM database (openrailwaymap.org), one for the "historic" aspect (openhistoricalmap.org), so it's a matter of programming for the railway map renderer to include the history aspect. --- Edit: Just notice the following note about OHM: "As opposed to other projects such as OpenSeaMap, OHM makes use of its own database independent of OSM." A pity, as this means ORM won't automatically pick up history. OSM does have a "4D" proposal to include time: http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/OSM-4D http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/OSM-4D , but it seems that it is not yet active.
jcranmer 9y ago
There's definitely some historical routes on there. If you look at the old B&O mainline, they have the historical route of Mount Airy Loop, which was discontinued in the 1950s. They don't have the original planes, though, which was ripped up in 1839 (it was built in 1830). It's somewhat understandable, given that the location of some of the route is pure conjecture at this point.
niftich 9y ago
OpenStreetMap, the (only?) backing dataset for OpenRailwayMap, is a little picky about purely historical features, as they generally seek to document current facts on the ground. Check OSM policies before you contribute. That being said, there's plently of historical rail -- running the gamut from disused, abandoned, railbanked, to never-knew-it-was-there -- visible in OpenRailwayMap. A good example is zooming in on Lima, Ohio, between Columbus and Fort Wayne. Dashed lines are everywhere.
- Symbiote 9y ago
  Disused or abandoned railway lines are still useful for old-fashioned map-based navigation. Even if the track and ballast has been removed, there's still a narrow, graded path across the landscape, often easily visible from surrounding hills.
  - emj 9y ago
    Those non existent tracks can be mapped in Openstreetmap as well, but not exactly as a railway.
vidanay 9y ago
If I had to bet, I'd say Bascom Ave also used to be a railroad.
pasbesoin 9y ago
Every time my family takes a trip to northern Wisconsin and the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, my father annoys... err, entertains us with recollection and speculation about where all the old lines ran. (After the first hour or so, the demand on one's continued attention becomes a bit draining...) He -- and his ilk -- would love something like that. I wonder how far back DeLorme published its atlases. I should look for some old, second-hand copies.
- maxerickson 9y ago
  A lot of the old rail lines in those areas were just temporary logging rails though. That narrow gauge stuff probably won't be on any maps, certainly no modern commercial map. http://geo.msu.edu/extra/geogmich/rr-logging.html http://geo.msu.edu/extra/geogmich/rr-logging.html If you poke around you can find digital copies of old plat books of Michigan, going back to when railroad companies owned most of the land.
  - pasbesoin 9y ago
    Thanks!
saagarjha 9y ago
> straight through the Trader Joe's parking lot at Homestead ends, then continued through to tracks that still exist on the other side of 280. Huh, I was walking along Peninsular Avenue a while back and was wondering what that odd, straight, flat area beyond the fence was. Cool to know it used to be a rail line!
- Stratoscope 9y ago
  Yup, that's exactly where it was. If you look at the area in satellite view, you can see where you could draw a straight line extending from Foothill through the shopping center and behind the houses on Peninsular, and from there straight to the still-existing tracks south of 280 that serve the Permanente cement plant. I find it interesting that when they built the shopping center at Foothill and Homestead and the Springwood Apartments next door - which I assume was long after the railroad tracks were gone - they avoided building directly on top of the old right of way but kept it as a driveway through each parking lot. No idea why - contamination? Even more fun, look up the area in Google Earth (the desktop client, not the web-based "New" Earth), turn on View/Historical Imagery, and slide the timeline all the way back to 1948 when the railway ran through there. You can also see where it ran behind Fry's in Palo Alto. This 1948 photo covers a big chunk of the Peninsula and South Bay - it's really interesting to see how things looked back then and compare with later years. All those regular patterns of dots you see when you zoom out? Orchards!
  - saagarjha 9y ago
    Intersting…it seems that the two lines actually used to meet up at where Foothill and Grant intersect now, north of 280. The "meeting point" was moved to the other side of 280 and the old line was cut off later.
  - andrewaylett 9y ago
    I don't know about the US, but in the UK one reason to avoid building on old railway lines is that they might technically still be railway infrastructure. For example, the newly-rebuilt Borders Railway, south from Edinburgh, was only able to be built because in a limited sense, it had never stopped being a railway so many of the required permissions were already in place.
stuaxo 9y ago
On the UK map you can see all the closed railways - zoom in to London then go south and see all the dotted lines.

ucaetano 9y ago

This might interest you: https://drive.google.com/open?id=1AzVOviQ2o0fJQtwONbVHk7M3TBs&usp=sharing https://drive.google.com/open?id=1AzVOviQ2o0fJQtwONbVHk7M3TB...

femto 9y ago

Just what your ordered? http://www.openhistoricalmap.org/ http://www.openhistoricalmap.org/ http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Open_Historical_Map http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Open_Historical_Map Given that it is all based on the OSM database, I'd imagine OpenHistoricalMap would already cover historical railways? There is a renderer for the "railway" aspect of the OSM database (openrailwaymap.org), one for the "historic" aspect (openhistoricalmap.org), so it's a matter of programming for the railway map renderer to include the history aspect. --- Edit: Just notice the following note about OHM: "As opposed to other projects such as OpenSeaMap, OHM makes use of its own database independent of OSM." A pity, as this means ORM won't automatically pick up history. OSM does have a "4D" proposal to include time: http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/OSM-4D http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/OSM-4D , but it seems that it is not yet active.

jcranmer 9y ago

There's definitely some historical routes on there. If you look at the old B&O mainline, they have the historical route of Mount Airy Loop, which was discontinued in the 1950s. They don't have the original planes, though, which was ripped up in 1839 (it was built in 1830). It's somewhat understandable, given that the location of some of the route is pure conjecture at this point.

niftich 9y ago

OpenStreetMap, the (only?) backing dataset for OpenRailwayMap, is a little picky about purely historical features, as they generally seek to document current facts on the ground. Check OSM policies before you contribute. That being said, there's plently of historical rail -- running the gamut from disused, abandoned, railbanked, to never-knew-it-was-there -- visible in OpenRailwayMap. A good example is zooming in on Lima, Ohio, between Columbus and Fort Wayne. Dashed lines are everywhere.

Symbiote 9y ago
Disused or abandoned railway lines are still useful for old-fashioned map-based navigation. Even if the track and ballast has been removed, there's still a narrow, graded path across the landscape, often easily visible from surrounding hills.
- emj 9y ago
  Those non existent tracks can be mapped in Openstreetmap as well, but not exactly as a railway.

vidanay 9y ago

If I had to bet, I'd say Bascom Ave also used to be a railroad.

pasbesoin 9y ago

Every time my family takes a trip to northern Wisconsin and the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, my father annoys... err, entertains us with recollection and speculation about where all the old lines ran. (After the first hour or so, the demand on one's continued attention becomes a bit draining...) He -- and his ilk -- would love something like that. I wonder how far back DeLorme published its atlases. I should look for some old, second-hand copies.

maxerickson 9y ago
A lot of the old rail lines in those areas were just temporary logging rails though. That narrow gauge stuff probably won't be on any maps, certainly no modern commercial map. http://geo.msu.edu/extra/geogmich/rr-logging.html http://geo.msu.edu/extra/geogmich/rr-logging.html If you poke around you can find digital copies of old plat books of Michigan, going back to when railroad companies owned most of the land.
- pasbesoin 9y ago
  Thanks!

saagarjha 9y ago

> straight through the Trader Joe's parking lot at Homestead ends, then continued through to tracks that still exist on the other side of 280. Huh, I was walking along Peninsular Avenue a while back and was wondering what that odd, straight, flat area beyond the fence was. Cool to know it used to be a rail line!

Stratoscope 9y ago
Yup, that's exactly where it was. If you look at the area in satellite view, you can see where you could draw a straight line extending from Foothill through the shopping center and behind the houses on Peninsular, and from there straight to the still-existing tracks south of 280 that serve the Permanente cement plant. I find it interesting that when they built the shopping center at Foothill and Homestead and the Springwood Apartments next door - which I assume was long after the railroad tracks were gone - they avoided building directly on top of the old right of way but kept it as a driveway through each parking lot. No idea why - contamination? Even more fun, look up the area in Google Earth (the desktop client, not the web-based "New" Earth), turn on View/Historical Imagery, and slide the timeline all the way back to 1948 when the railway ran through there. You can also see where it ran behind Fry's in Palo Alto. This 1948 photo covers a big chunk of the Peninsula and South Bay - it's really interesting to see how things looked back then and compare with later years. All those regular patterns of dots you see when you zoom out? Orchards!
- saagarjha 9y ago
  Intersting…it seems that the two lines actually used to meet up at where Foothill and Grant intersect now, north of 280. The "meeting point" was moved to the other side of 280 and the old line was cut off later.
- andrewaylett 9y ago
  I don't know about the US, but in the UK one reason to avoid building on old railway lines is that they might technically still be railway infrastructure. For example, the newly-rebuilt Borders Railway, south from Edinburgh, was only able to be built because in a limited sense, it had never stopped being a railway so many of the required permissions were already in place.

stuaxo 9y ago

On the UK map you can see all the closed railways - zoom in to London then go south and see all the dotted lines.