Amboy, IL: CB&Q's Route and Green River Ordnance Plant

Normally when I do a posting about a railroad in a town it is about its facilities such as a depot, yard, roundhouse, etc. In this case, it is a matter of figuring out how CB&Q got through the town. Unlike the IC where the town was built around the railroad, in this case the railroad was built around the town.

From the east, we can see the land scar just south of Shaw Road. It then curves northwest where we can see a treeline. Looking at an old aerial photo confirms this curve and westward boundary was the RoW.

Satellite

It went west down Bacon Street until it turned south at the land scar that we can still see west of Amboy Central School. After it crossed Provost Street, it turned west and followed Hubbard Street out of town. A treeline shows were it jogged a little south. The quarry by Robbins Road was a lot smaller in 1939:

1939 Aerial Photo from ILHAP

You can see enough treelines to see it continued straight west past Walton, IL. What caught my eye was the wye just west of the quarry. This does not exist on the 1939 photos. The SPV Map indicates there was a Green River Ordnance Plant northwest of Amboy. Obviously this track to the north was to get in on the action that IC also accessed. This set of parallel roads caught my eye. If you zoom in, you realized they are tree covered ammo bunkers spaced far enough apart so that if one blows up, the others won't blow up. The more you look, the more you find. You also find sets of small buildings with space between them. (example) The bunkers would be where they stored the ammo and these buildings would be where they make it. Again, if one building blew up, they did not want the other buildings to also blow up.