HI

I found another cattle guard , this was the type , that the Pennsylvania Railroad was useing . Pat

Pat -

When I think of cattle guards used on the railroads, this Pennsy drawing is what comes to mind. But when you look it up on the internet, you get all kinds of answers for everything from cattle guards for roads to people who guard cattle! But practically nothing on these "traditional" railroad style cattle guards. Now my question is; how were these supposed to be used? The railroads were expected to fence in their right-of-ways to keep cattle off of the tracks. Where farmers and ranchers had to cross to get to the other side, then these cattle guards were used. But they were to keep cattle from crossing, but how about when they WANTED the cattle to cross over? Were the triangle shaped guards then let down on both sides? If so, how was this accomplished? Were there hinges at the bottom? I can't see any in the drawings, but maybe I am missing them.

I agree that a couple of these placed along a museum right of way would look "cool". The Iron Horse Central has one. I wonder if they get any questions about it from their riders?

Les

They are to discourage the cattle from turning off the crossing, straying along the track, climbing onto the back of a slow passenger train, and walking down the aisle to the great consternation of the female passengers. The track goes through the guard, there is one on each side of the roadway. If it is desired to keep the cattle from CROSSING the tracks, fences and gates are used.

In open range territory they can also separate ranges. Probably much more common on roads than on railroads, although there probably still are some railroads on open ranges.

Cattle guards are a marvel with no moving parts. They only have the one state of being, lacking any condition in which a cow might cross. They are always "opaque to cows, transparent to trains".

A cattle guard is part of a fence. If you needed to get a cow across that fence, you'd detour to the nearest gate. The railroad or farmer might even build a gate nearby, so the farmer can recover cows who somehow breach the cattle guard or a damaged part of fence.

What I would expect to find is a railroad RoW fenced on both sides so that no cows can get onto it at all. Anywhere there was an interruption in that fence (i.e. for a grade crossing), it would be protected by cattle guards as needed. I could be wrong but I don't believe the railroads would ever allow grazing on the right of way. Except for planned vegetation control, like they do with goats nowadays.