Although they do seem perfectly parallel, these winding railroad tracks were obviously not intentional. After an earthquake hit New Zealand, it left the railroad tracks looking like this.
Although expensive, dangerous, albeit a geo-engineering marvel, New Zeeland uses an earthquake and its national rail system to prove the mathematical theory that parallel lines never meet.
Is that sharper than 9 3/4" radius? That hurt, Mr. SP. True but it still hurt. The EX-Milwaukee line through my hometown of Austin, MN now looks excellent after having been rebuilt by CP. Doug
Yes. The line south of Austin was relaid with CWR a few years ago and the line north is still stick rail but has been straightened and reballasted. Hopefully, the ultimate goal is to replace the stick rail too because some of it doesn't look the best. There are three different basic colors of ballast on the north line too - red, black, and the latest, gray. Doug
Yeah, before the gray, it was kind of designer ballast with mainly red (which I think is dark pink lady) with a black stripe on the shoulders. I wonder if that could be seen in satellite photos. Doug
This photo was also taken up close so the bends are exaggerated. I had seen photos from a different angle, not too long after the quake, that showed much lest bending. Then the crew just pulled the rails and sleepers back to where they were. When I found the link to this is was just by chance.
