Brookville Tunnel
Diagram of the Brookville Tunnel
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| Overview | |
|---|---|
| Line | Chesapeake and Ohio Railway (C&O) Mountain Subdivision – previously C&O Railroad and Blue Ridge Railroad |
| Location | Albemarle County |
| Coordinates | 38°02′38″N 78°47′55″W / 38.04389°N 78.79861°WCoordinates: 38°02′38″N 78°47′55″W / 38.04389°N 78.79861°W |
| Status | Demolished, replaced by cut |
| Operation | |
| Opened | 1856 |
| Closed | 1960s–70s |
| Owner |
Blue Ridge Railroad (1856–1870) Chesapeake and Ohio Railroad (1870–1878) Chesapeake and Ohio Railway (1878–abandonment) |
| Technical | |
| Length | 869 feet (265 m) |
| No. of tracks | 1 |
| Track gauge | 4 ft 8 1⁄2 in (1,435 mm) |
| Grade | 70 ft⁄mi (1.326%) |
The Brookville Tunnel (also Brooksville Tunnel) was a historic railroad tunnel engineered by Claudius Crozet during the construction of the Blue Ridge Railroad in the 1850s. The tunnel was part of a series of four tunnels used to cross the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia for the Virginia Central Railroad of the United States. The Brookville Tunnel was the second tunnel used to cross the mountains from the east (the easternmost being the Greenwood Tunnel), and was located approximately 1.5 miles (2.4 km) west of the village of Greenwood, Virginia.
During its construction, numerous cave-ins and landslides occurred because of the fragile and weak rock the tunnel passed through, and at one point, an outbreak of cholera forced work to stop. By October 1856 the tunnel was completed at a cost of $114,600, having been lined with a thick elliptical brick arch to hold back the earth. The Brookville Tunnel was used by the Virginia Central Railroad, and after 1868, the line's successor, the Chesapeake and Ohio Railroad. After the reorganization of the line in 1878 as the Chesapeake and Ohio Railway, the tunnel continued to be used until it was demolished and replaced by a cut during the construction of Interstate 64 in the 1960s and 1970s, at which point it was one of only two of Crozet's original four tunnels still in use.
On March 5, 1849, the Virginia General Assembly passed an act to incorporate the Blue Ridge Railroad. This railroad was to construct a rail line over the Blue Ridge Mountains for the Louisa railroad (renamed as the Virginia Central Railroad in February 1850) from a point near Blair Park at the eastern base of the mountains to Waynesboro in the Shenandoah Valley via Rockfish Gap.Claudius Crozet was appointed as chief engineer of the Blue Ridge Railroad and developed a plan to cross the mountains using a series of four tunnels. The first tunnel from the east was the Greenwood Tunnel, built through a difficult and insecure ridge near Greenwood. Brookville tunnel was located 1.5 miles (2.4 km) west of the Greenwood Tunnel, also built through a small offshoot spur of the Blue Ridge Mountains.
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