Since I launched the Forgotten Railroads blog series, I’ve been on the lookout for abandoned railroad related places and landmarks. A while back I learned about the abandoned Clinton Massachusetts Railroad Tunnel. Clinton is located in central Massachusetts just north of Worcester. The tunnel is located near the Wachusett Dam.
The 800-foot tunnel saw its first train on June 2, 1903, and continued servicing the 105 mile Central Massachusetts Railroad from Boston’s North Station to Northampton, MA for decades. Freight and passenger service started to decline by 1958, and parts of the line in western and central Mass never saw a train again.
The tunnel is very popular with railfans and folks that want to explore abandoned places. When looking from the outside, the tunnel light can be seen from the other end, making it appear to be shorter than it really is. Some sources online say it’s haunted, and I’m not sure if it is but it is so quiet inside the tunnel that you can hear every water drop hitting the ground. Once at the halfway point, it gets very dark and the temperature drops. There are some wet spots inside the tunnel and the east portal was quite wet. When photographing inside the tunnel, I used the external flash on my DSLR camera. The flashlight came in handy walking through the tunnel.
I hope to explore more of the 105 miles route of Central Mass Railroad in the new year. Parts of the abandoned railroad line are now a bike trail, and other parts are untouched, with plants growing over them, and some just a narrow path in the woods.
