Souvenirs of Yesteryear: Railroad triumphs over canal

So what else is new? Railroads put the canal out of business back in the mid 1800s. The Chenango Canal operated from 1837 to 1878. The Delaware, Lackawanna & Western (DL&W) Railroad began running between Utica and Sherburne in 1868. The DL&W is now the New York, Susquehanna & Western (NYS&W).

The photo shows the bridge where the DL&W crossed over the canal in the Town of Sherburne, about a mile south of State Route 80, near milepost 248. This is one of the five places in Chenango County where the main line of the railroad crossed the main line of the canal. The others are in the Town of North Norwich where OSG is today, in the City of Norwich at Borden Avenue and at Virginia Lane, and in the Town of Greene across the river from the Genegantslet Golf Course.

Investigating the crossover are Bullthistle Hikers John Carhart, Ted Robinson, and Gail Merian. Gail is pointing to the line of the canal prism.

The passageway under this bridge is now only about 10 feet wide. The massive concrete abutments that restrict the passage could not have been there when the canal was operational. The canal ditch was a prism 42 feet wide at the top and 24 feet wide at the bottom. The water was 4 feet deep. These measurements appear in Michele A. McFee’s 1993 book, “Limestone Locks and Overgrowth...”, page 47.