Trenton Street Improvements

Neighborhood Street Improvements

- 2004 -

A pictorial overview of the work the city of Trenton is finally getting around to doing on this main entrance street to the capital city of New Jersey -- I have waited over 20 years for these things, which have always been talked about

30 June 2004 -- after cutting the cement sidewalk on the outer corner of my property with a very powerful round blade saw, they started digging out the concrete up to the curbing -- it is absolutely amazing the movements the power shovel can be made to do

the trench on the right will be for the small line of bricks on the outer side of the sidewalk -- what I do not understand, is why they do not do a complete job and replace the entire sidewalk, most of which is in very ratty condition

part of the original curbing is made of lengths of solid granite, probably from New England or upstate Pennsylvania or New Jersey -- here you can see a curved section after being uplifted from its bed where it has rested, probably for about a century -- I asked the dude if I could get a section or two for my small garden, but decided against it for several reasons, even though he said yes -- it is a total waste of materials just to dump the many sections somewhere!

here you can see one of the saw cuts in the cement -- it is mostly soil below, but on the street edges, some of the old paving bricks appear -- the city seems to have a habit of simply laying more asphalt over what was there previously, which I think is stupid -- of course it costs them less, but the street is already humped in the center -- if they continue doing it, the street will eventually be higher than the curbs!

here you can see 4 of the 5 main materials that they have been encountering in the excavations -- 1] the friable fine grained shale they used for part of the curbing -- 2] the old paving bricks -- 3] the original concrete layer containing many relatively large rounded pebbles -- 4] cut out sections of the older asphalt top layer -- they had to dig up the street side of the curb slightly in order to remove the stone curb material itself

they continued down my side of the street, doing the same thing -- notice one of the new old style street lamps on the left hand side -- they have not been connected yet -- the air conditioner at the top right is in the window of my study, where I work 24/7 on the dumb computer (and frequently fall asleep in the chair!)! My study takes up the entire front part of the first floor

at about where the shovel is located they excavated a wider section of the sidewalk for a tree -- it will be at about the left side of my left front display window -- another thing I do not understand is why they are not eliminating all the telephone poles -- I believe there is a federal law that requires all cables to be placed underground when a city does major revisions to the streets -- those old poles have no asthetic appeal whatsoever!

7 July 2004 -- at this point they are placing the edge guides for pouring the cement curbs -- long metal plates held upright by rebar -- curiously, a lot of those stone and cement fragments were left in the bottom -- not exactly what I might call a neat and totally thorough job -- so they would have to use a little more cement and it might cost a tad more -- isn't that what we are paying extremely exorbitant taxes for?

OK, the curb section has been laid -- the end of the corner dips somewhat towards the eventual street level, making it easier for baby carriages, bicycles (which should not ride on the sidewalk anyway!), and wheelchairs to access the sidewalk from its ends

a view after they took the curb mold panels away -- you may notice a white trailer type thing in the empty lot across the street -- it is a Trenton Police Command Post that suddenly sprouted up -- it is brightly spotlighted at night, run by a noisy generator which seems to break down frequently because they keep changing it

here we can see the several very vintage street materials previously used -- a small broken piece of the shale curbing -- notice how friable it has become when exposed to the elements/freezing, causing spalding or separation along the weaker layers, much better seen in another pic -- the extremely durable solid fine grained granite -- and finally, very few of the original paving bricks from Patton Pennsylvania were uncovered (I was able to salvage two of them that were mostly intact) -- The town of Patton was founded in 1893. Shortly thereafter, the Patton Clay Manufacturing Co. commenced operation. The plant employed 100 men and made sewer pipe and paving and building brick. By the early part of the twentieth century, the plant stretched for eight acres and included two factory buildings, thirty-seven lime kilns, and duplexes where workers were housed. The Patton Clay Manufacturing Co. continued its operations until the mid-1950's -- the incised company symbol/name is called a Frog: Early molds had no frog, an indentation in the panel which in later years held the brand, so the brands were sometimes burned into the wood and sometimes cut with a knife. The frog, which dates at least to 1690 in England, was indeed important, for a number of reasons. This indentation on the bottom of the brick not only provided a place for the brand, it also saved material and provided a "key" for the mortar, insuring a better bond during bricklaying

I assume that they were laid in the early 1900s -- they, as well as Belgian blocks of solid granite, underly most of my side street, long since simply covered over by layers of asphalt

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as time permits I shall be adding pics and commentary as work progresses

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	30 June 2004 -- after cutting the cement sidewalk on the outer corner of my property with a very powerful round blade saw, they started digging out the concrete up to the curbing -- it is absolutely amazing the movements the power shovel can be made to do
	the trench on the right will be for the small line of bricks on the outer side of the sidewalk -- what I do not understand, is why they do not do a complete job and replace the entire sidewalk, most of which is in very ratty condition
	part of the original curbing is made of lengths of solid granite, probably from New England or upstate Pennsylvania or New Jersey -- here you can see a curved section after being uplifted from its bed where it has rested, probably for about a century -- I asked the dude if I could get a section or two for my small garden, but decided against it for several reasons, even though he said yes -- it is a total waste of materials just to dump the many sections somewhere!
	here you can see one of the saw cuts in the cement -- it is mostly soil below, but on the street edges, some of the old paving bricks appear -- the city seems to have a habit of simply laying more asphalt over what was there previously, which I think is stupid -- of course it costs them less, but the street is already humped in the center -- if they continue doing it, the street will eventually be higher than the curbs!
	here you can see 4 of the 5 main materials that they have been encountering in the excavations -- 1] the friable fine grained shale they used for part of the curbing -- 2] the old paving bricks -- 3] the original concrete layer containing many relatively large rounded pebbles -- 4] cut out sections of the older asphalt top layer -- they had to dig up the street side of the curb slightly in order to remove the stone curb material itself
	they continued down my side of the street, doing the same thing -- notice one of the new old style street lamps on the left hand side -- they have not been connected yet -- the air conditioner at the top right is in the window of my study, where I work 24/7 on the dumb computer (and frequently fall asleep in the chair!)! My study takes up the entire front part of the first floor
	at about where the shovel is located they excavated a wider section of the sidewalk for a tree -- it will be at about the left side of my left front display window -- another thing I do not understand is why they are not eliminating all the telephone poles -- I believe there is a federal law that requires all cables to be placed underground when a city does major revisions to the streets -- those old poles have no asthetic appeal whatsoever!
	7 July 2004 -- at this point they are placing the edge guides for pouring the cement curbs -- long metal plates held upright by rebar -- curiously, a lot of those stone and cement fragments were left in the bottom -- not exactly what I might call a neat and totally thorough job -- so they would have to use a little more cement and it might cost a tad more -- isn't that what we are paying extremely exorbitant taxes for?
	OK, the curb section has been laid -- the end of the corner dips somewhat towards the eventual street level, making it easier for baby carriages, bicycles (which should not ride on the sidewalk anyway!), and wheelchairs to access the sidewalk from its ends
	a view after they took the curb mold panels away -- you may notice a white trailer type thing in the empty lot across the street -- it is a Trenton Police Command Post that suddenly sprouted up -- it is brightly spotlighted at night, run by a noisy generator which seems to break down frequently because they keep changing it
	here we can see the several very vintage street materials previously used -- a small broken piece of the shale curbing -- notice how friable it has become when exposed to the elements/freezing, causing spalding or separation along the weaker layers, much better seen in another pic -- the extremely durable solid fine grained granite -- and finally, very few of the original paving bricks from Patton Pennsylvania were uncovered (I was able to salvage two of them that were mostly intact) -- The town of Patton was founded in 1893. Shortly thereafter, the Patton Clay Manufacturing Co. commenced operation. The plant employed 100 men and made sewer pipe and paving and building brick. By the early part of the twentieth century, the plant stretched for eight acres and included two factory buildings, thirty-seven lime kilns, and duplexes where workers were housed. The Patton Clay Manufacturing Co. continued its operations until the mid-1950's -- the incised company symbol/name is called a Frog: Early molds had no frog, an indentation in the panel which in later years held the brand, so the brands were sometimes burned into the wood and sometimes cut with a knife. The frog, which dates at least to 1690 in England, was indeed important, for a number of reasons. This indentation on the bottom of the brick not only provided a place for the brand, it also saved material and provided a "key" for the mortar, insuring a better bond during bricklaying I assume that they were laid in the early 1900s -- they, as well as Belgian blocks of solid granite, underly most of my side street, long since simply covered over by layers of asphalt
x	x as time permits I shall be adding pics and commentary as work progresses