Info from Underhill and other sources
"Decades of exploration in the Peace River and Canadian Rockies have uncovered vast deposits of coal. But there is an enormous gap between identifying a marketable resource and having a market for that resource. Among the various scenarios for exploitation of these vast coal reserves, Kilborn Engineering published a feasibility study in 1975, for extraction of coal from what would later become the Tumbler Ridge Quintette Mine. The original rail alignment detailed in the 1975 study north to Chetwynd was abandoned. A new alignment was blazed, officially named the Tumbler Sub-division beginning at Tacheeda on the BC Rail north-south mainline, running 84.5 miles roughly east following the desolate Table Valley before reaching its 3, 815 feet summit under the Rocky Mountains crossing the Sukunka river to the new town site of Tumbler Ridge. The alignment, with a ruling grade of just 1.5% empty eastbound, 1.2% loaded westbound, required four tunnels and eleven bridges. Two tunnels, the 2nd and 4th longest railroad tunnels in Canada, Table Tunnel at 5.6 miles length and Wolverine Tunnel at 3.7 miles length. Although loaded trains would be running downhill through the 1.5% Table Tunnel, they would be pulling through the 1.2% Wolverine Tunnel." (from oil electric blog)
Images from Underhill land surveying service
"Decades of exploration in the Peace River and Canadian Rockies have uncovered vast deposits of coal. But there is an enormous gap between identifying a marketable resource and having a market for that resource. Among the various scenarios for exploitation of these vast coal reserves, Kilborn Engineering published a feasibility study in 1975, for extraction of coal from what would later become the Tumbler Ridge Quintette Mine. The original rail alignment detailed in the 1975 study north to Chetwynd was abandoned. A new alignment was blazed, officially named the Tumbler Sub-division beginning at Tacheeda on the BC Rail north-south mainline, running 84.5 miles roughly east following the desolate Table Valley before reaching its 3, 815 feet summit under the Rocky Mountains crossing the Sukunka river to the new town site of Tumbler Ridge. The alignment, with a ruling grade of just 1.5% empty eastbound, 1.2% loaded westbound, required four tunnels and eleven bridges. Two tunnels, the 2nd and 4th longest railroad tunnels in Canada, Table Tunnel at 5.6 miles length and Wolverine Tunnel at 3.7 miles length. Although loaded trains would be running downhill through the 1.5% Table Tunnel, they would be pulling through the 1.2% Wolverine Tunnel." (from oil electric blog)
Images from Underhill land surveying service
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