National Register Testing of a Railroad Embankment for the Hollygrove Drainage Improvements Feature, Southeast Louisiana Urban Flood Control Project, Orleans Parish, Louisiana

摘要

Earth Search, Inc., was contracted by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, New Orleans District (NODCOE), to conduct National Register (NRHP) testing of an historic railroad embankment in the Hollygrove neighborhood of New Orleans in support of construction of the Hollygrove Drainage Improvements feature of the Southeast Louisiana Urban Flood Control Project. The project area is comprised of a linear parcel of land measuring approximately 840 m (2755.2 ft) in length and 12 m (39.6 ft) in width, or approximately 25 acres. Although it was expected that the remains of cribwork for support of the railroad crossties would be preserved within the embankment, it appears that cribbing was never in fact utilized along that portion of the embankment within the project area. Instead, it appears that logs from trees felled during clearing the swamp for the railway were utilized to form the base of the embankment. Features associated with this initial construction were found within the horizon of the backswamp that originally occupied the Hollygrove neighborhood in Trenches 1 through 6, and they appeared to be best preserved in Trenches 3 and 4. Subsequently, vertical pilings were utilized to stabilize the embankment along the majority of its course; only those portions adjacent to the former Oleander Canal were devoid of pilings. Excavation of six trenches and 18 exploratory areas, in conjunction with extensive archival research, has thus yielded considerable data on the engineering, construction and maintenance of the railroad embankment. It is the contractor's opinion that NRHP test excavations have exhausted the research potential of the embankment, and that further excavations are unlikely to yield additional information. Consequently, site 16OR152 is ineligible for nomination to the National Register of Historic Places. No additional archeological investigations are recommended.