We have a scenic view from our house of the old CPR mainline in New Brunswick, Canada, This part of of the Railroad is now owned by Southern New Brunswick Railways, a small enough outfit to be able to be rather casual sometimes. They often park the train and come over to the local diner for breakfast.
Last night I heard a locomotive idling for a longer than normal time. There was a train parked at the beginning of the bridge behind our house. One Loco and as it turned out seven flatcars. Each flatcar carried a steel tank on its side, loaded on steel beams and timber chocks. Each of four tanks took up the full length of a flatcar, the other three each took up about two thirds the length. The tanks looked to be about sixteen feet in diameter- I would guess a third of their diameter was higher than the loco. These things are big!
Well, it turns out that somebody didn't do their homework. As each car was slowly brought up to the end of the bridge, everything stopped and inches were cut off of the steel beams under the tanks that projected out either side. The train moved forward 'till the rear of the car approached the bridge and the process was repeated. They shut down at about ten last night with the train half over the bridge and finished up the job this morning. I'm told the tanks were on their way by rail from Saint John to Harvey, then by truck to the pulp mill at Nackawic. I expect a few overhead wires will have to be cut! I would have thought overall maximum width would have been an essential spec. for the crew who did the loading!