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Wiktionary
rathole

n. 1 An entrance to a living area or passageway used by mice or rats. 2 A living area used by mice or rats. 3 A particularly squalid human residence. 4 An area of a silo that has undergone ratholing, so that material moves mostly through the centre and accumulates around the edges. vb. 1 (context transitive English) to hoard. 2 (context transitive English) to take a conversation off topic, especially in technical meetings. 3 (context transitive English) to surreptitiously or prematurely remove chips during a poker game. 4 (context intransitive English) (of material) to empty only in the center of a hopper or silo, persisting circumferentially.

WordNet
rathole
  1. n. a hole (as in the wall of a building) made by rats

  2. a small dirty uncomfortable room

Wikipedia
Rathole

Rathole may refer to:

  • Rathole, Edmonton, a former two-lane tunnel in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada
  • removing chips inappropriately from the table in poker
  • an audio file archiving tool in Soundfont
  • a jingle on the show MacBreak Weekly
  • a channel on EFNet IRC
  • a method of money laundering
Rathole (Edmonton)

The Rathole, officially the 109 Street Subway, was a two-lane tunnel constructed in 1927 on 109 Street in the northwest corner of Downtown, in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. It traversed north-south under the former Canadian National (CN) railyards between 104 Avenue and 105 Avenue, . It was 168 metres in length, 3.3 metres in height, and constructed to accommodate automobile, bicycle and pedestrian traffic.

The City of Edmonton proposed the construction of a tunnel/underpass in 1926 to burrow under a span of 22 railway tracks in the old CN railyards. A call for tenders was put out in the following year, 1927, with seven parties bidding for the contract. Jamies Construction Co. Ltd. received the contract from city engineer A. W. Haddow to construct the tunnel.

The 109 Street Subway was officially opened by then Mayor Ambrose Bury on October 19, 1928. An Edmonton alderman later coined the name “rathole” for the tunnel.

In 1957, a transportation study recommended the construction of a parallel subway to improve the traffic flow. However, in lieu of this recommendation, in 1960 the city constructed an overpass over the CN rail tracks further to the east along 105 Street.

The tunnel was susceptible to seasonal flooding, and proved hazardous because of its low clearance and visibility upon entrance and exit. There were also safety issues concerning pedestrian usage of the tunnel.

The tunnel remained opened for 73 years, during which, as many as 27,000 cars passed through daily.

With the railway yard now removed, the city tendered the project for the demolition of the tunnel and conversion of the area into a divided arterial road in 2000. Standard General Inc. was awarded prime contractor for the project.

The project began in April 2000, at which time, there were concerns of inconvenience during the scheduled four months for the project. City transportation engineers managed to complete the project three weeks ahead of schedule without compromising safety, environmental, and budgetary concerns. This was accomplished by beginning demolition of the tunnel from the north end instead of taking the entire tunnel out at once. Concrete removed from the tunnel was recycled and used in the fill.

On July 4, 2000, 109 Street reopened as a six-lane divided arterial road running between 104 Avenue and 105 Avenue.

In 2002, the project was awarded the American Public Works Association Project of the Year Award, the first time the award was won by a Canadian firm of consulting engineers.

Usage examples of "rathole".

Frightened the chupacabras is going to come hopping out of a rathole and bite them on the ass!

Foxes down foxholes and rats in ratholes may be wailing, true, that's how it works, but we are not about to find any starving hyenas in western Wisconsin.

Her face is pale and sweaty, her eyes huge with unshed tears, but the moving shadows on the ceiling no longer look like faces to her - the faces of trudging children, of rats in their ratholes, foxes in foxholes, eye of the King, Abbalah-Abbalah-doon!

To her it had always sounded like the music you heard in the old cartoons, the ones where mice in white gloves ran in and out of ratholes with dizzying, feverish speed.

Down there in the foxholes and the ratholes where the sun never shines?

The doctor felt sick and helpless to deal with this abomination and decided to barricade himself for the night in one room with a closely fitting door, where he could stop the ratholes with broken glass.

It was bad enough on the groundbut belowground it was ratholes, with suffocating smells.

For the day when there'd be enough of them to swarm up out of their ratholes and attempt what Lev Merrin had tried in 238.

Inos had folded her bedding into a thick bundle and was sitting on it, pouting at the ratholes in the wainscoting opposite, while Azak was leaning back against the wall, legs straight.