Mt Washington Electrification Project

I was on the summit of Mt Washington yesterday and noticed that a project to bring electrical power via buried cable up the mountain has begun. It appears this is a 'top down project' in that they're started to pull the cable from the top of mountain down to the base at/near the Cog Railroad. It looks like the active part of the excavation is now about 1/2 down the hill to the Waumbek station, plus footings and concrete walls for an extension to the building near the old hiker room access.

Does anyone have any more info on the project? Am particularly interested in what, if any, steps will be taken to mitigate the impact of this construction on the alpine zone, such as replanting grasses/sedges, naturalizing the path with rocks, boulders, etc, erosion control, etc.

Also - the excavators have pushed the trash and scrap lumber which has accumulated over the past 100 years or so closer to the track. With the road that's being built, access to this trash, especially with vehicles, would be very much easier. Does anyone know if an effort will be made, either as part of the project or as a volunteer effort, to remove the trash and scrap lumber?

Perhaps this topic has already been covered here at VFTT. If so, please post a link to that thread.

Thanks.

Kevin

Damn - I remember reading an article, either at the Obs website or here, all about it, but neither I nor Google can seem to find it now...

That said, I don't remember any mention of either issue that bring up.

It was discussed here on observatory forums

MWO Forum

The WMUR link is dead, that's were I heard about it.

Another little tidbit of info is

NH State Parks

...and there's an article in todays ConMon.

http://www.concordmonitor.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20071003/FRONTPAGE/710030301

The Monitor article doesn't answer any of your questions, but it gives the name of the project manager that you can reach through the state website for more info.

By using the RR ROW they avoid all the paperwork associated with NF construction.

The photo shows a wide swath parallel to the RR that the workers travel on ATVs, imagine it could see some heavy bootleg hiking/skiing afterward.

Photos of cable installation

Cable being pulled through burried conduit at the summit. The foundation of the new electrical building is visible in the lower-left.


If you look closely, you can see the construction road on the north (opposite) side of the cog railway. Note vehicles at the head of the Great Gulf.

psmart said:

If you look closely, you can see the construction road on the north (opposite) side of the cog railway. Note vehicles at the head of the Great Gulf.

Click to expand...

Grrr. That's a very ecologically sensitive area; it's bad enough that the cog railway comes so close to it.