What is close is rail and the river below it. The North American Rail Network maintained by the Federal Railroad Administration and the Bureau of Transportation Statistics places a junction yard 2.01 miles south-east and the Glenwood yard 3.75 miles north-east, and the Transflo terminal sits 3.79 miles north-east. All of it is inside five miles.
Seven hundred and nineteen crossings, and twenty-eight of them restricted
Those neighbours sit in an extraordinarily crowded road network. Within 10 miles the National Bridge Inventory records 719 structures, and 28 of them are below legal loads.
Density and restriction are not the same thing, and here they pull apart. 719 crossings with 28 restricted is under 4%, a lower share than most rural circles in this state manage, because a built-up county replaces its bridges rather than posting them.
What density does change is the count of authorities. 17 of the 28 restricted crossings are municipal, against 4 state, 4 township, 1 county and 2 carried as railroad structures. In a valley of adjoining boroughs a short lane crosses several road departments, and each one posts its own streets.
Nothing tight for three miles, then it comes in steps
Those municipal postings start further out than the density suggests. The nearest restriction of any kind is 3.20 miles south, a county bridge clearing 49.0 tonnes, which a legal load crosses whole; the first that would make a driver think is 3.38 miles north-east at 17.2 tonnes.
From there it steps down rather than dropping. 30.8 tonnes 3.21 miles north-east, 39.0 tonnes 4.43 miles north — a band that takes a truck part loaded — and the lowest figure in the whole circle is 3.6 tonnes 8.42 miles out on a municipal structure the file records as closed rather than posted.
So the first three miles out of this borough are unrestricted in every direction, and the decisions start once a lane drops into the valley. For a truck standing at a house here that is the useful fact: getting to it is not the problem.
A borough with no working ground of its own
So the honest description of this address is that nothing industrial is filed inside it. The vermiculite plant 4.04 miles west and the junction yard 2.01 miles south-east are the nearest working sites, and both are somebody else’s to name.
That changes what turns up for sale and it is worth being straight about. Trucks here are more often owned by a contractor, a landscaper, a hauler or a family than by an operation with a gate, and they are parked at houses and small yards rather than in a fleet line.
It also changes the wear. A truck kept at a house does short trips and long stands, which puts the damage into batteries, brake contact faces, seals, tyres flat-spotting and fuel that has been in the tank too long — every bit of it fixable, none of it visible, and none of it a reason we would not buy.
A truck that has stood at a house for a year or two is normal here and it is not a problem for us. We would rather know it stood than be told it runs and find out on the day.
- The posting rules make room for exactly that — a collection at an address on the posted road counts as local traffic. Either way it is ours to work out: we come out and drive it away, we come out and tow it, we buy it remotely and arrange the tow, or you bring it to us.
- Can you get a big truck up here?The nearest restriction of any kind is 3.20 miles south and it clears 49.0 tonnes, so the first few miles out of this borough take a legal load whole in every direction.
In a borough whose nearest working sites are the vermiculite plant 4.04 miles west and a junction yard 2.01 miles south-east, the trucks come off one at a time, and we buy them that way.