Editing Wagonway (section)

== Pole road ==
<!-- linked from redirect [[Pole road]] -->
[[File:"Perdido", a pole road locomotive.jpg|thumb|''Perdido'', a steam pole road locomotive]]
Wooden rails continued to be used for temporary railroads into the twentieth century. Some timber harvesting companies in the southeastern [[United States]] created pole roads using unmarketable logs, which were effectively free, to create tracks at a cost of between $100 and $500 per mile. Permanence was not an issue, as the [[lumberjack]]s moved on to other stands of [[Tree|timber]] as each area was cleared.<ref name="Trains_1948">{{cite magazine| title=Pole Road Locomotives of the Early Days| magazine=[[Trains (magazine)|Trains]]| date=February 1948}}</ref> At least one such pole road system reportedly extended some {{convert|20|mi|km}}.<ref>[http://www.escohis.org/atmore_alabama (untitled)] {{dead link|date=March 2018}}</ref>

Typically the pole rails were [[Trunk (botany)|logs]] of {{convert|8 to 12|in|cm}} diameter, laid parallel directly on the ground without [[railroad tie|cross-ties]], and joined end-to-end with [[lap joint]]s and [[wood]]en [[wikt:peg|peg]]s. [[Rolling stock]] typically had wheels either with concave rims that hugged the top of the pole rails, or un-flanged wheels with separate guide wheels running against the side of each rail. Steam [[traction engine]]s and some purpose-built locomotives were successfully used for hauling trains of logs. For example, ''Perdido'' was built by [[Adams & Price Locomotive and Machinery Works]] of [[Nashville, Tennessee]] in 1885 for the [[Wallace, Sanford and Company]] sawmill at [[Atmore, Alabama|Williams Station, Alabama]], where it hauled up to seven cars of 3 or 4 logs each. This was a geared engine (4.5 to 1 [[gear train|gear ratio]]), driving four individually-rotating concave-rim wheels on stationary axles via chain drives; powerful but running less than {{convert|5|mph|km/h}}.<ref name="Trains_1948"/> Still later, modified [[semi-trailer truck|semitrailer tractors]] have been used.<ref>{{cite video| url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2-ScI_Gve0w| archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/varchive/youtube/20211211/2-ScI_Gve0w| archive-date=2021-12-11 | url-status=live| title=A Pole Road in use: A logging engine moves on tracks made from logs of wood in A...HD Stock Footage| date=June 21, 2014| publisher=CriticalPast| website=YouTube}}{{cbignore}}</ref>