Almost here! We hope to see you in Chattanooga this weekend! New information has been posted: http://tvrail.com/pages/tvrm-news-updates

I am looking forward to riding on Saturday behind 630. My last trip on the NS main was in 1994. It's been a long wait over the past 17 years.

==========from the TVRail site:

The first “21st Century Steam” public excursions will take place, appropriately, during TVRM’s 50th Anniversary event, RAILFEST, held over Labor Day weekend. Trips are scheduled for 10:00 AM and 2:00 PM Saturday, September 3 and Sunday, September 4, and will be pulled by TVRM’s recently-restored, ex-Southern Railway 2-8-0 steam locomotive #630 These excursion trips are the first of their kind, traveling from TVRM’s Grand Junction Station, over Norfolk Southern’s mainline track and along NS's DeButts rail yard to downtown Chattanooga. The trains will turn around at CT Wye behind the Chattanooga Choo Choo before returning to Grand Junction. These rides will be approximately fifteen miles, and one and a half hours for the round trip.

Looks nice, but they lost my money but not posting this sooner... I can't plan a trip in a week... Had I known more of the details sooner i'd have been interested but the site wasn't updated ahead of time...

I'll see 630 at some point, just not this time.

Jay,

This information has been on the TVRM's website for a couple of weeks now...at least two, maybe three weeks.

Congratulations to the TVRM team whose years of hard work and dedicated professionalism have been an important ingredient in the birth of this joint venture with NS.

And also of course profound thanks to Mr. Wick Moorman and his team at NS for their recognition that there's PR power in celebrating their proud history through the use of the steam engine and the role it played in the growth of the nation.

Here's to a highly successful venture!!

Ross Rowland

Update ~ http://tvrail.com/pages/tvrm-news-updates

http://timesfreepress.com/news/2011/sep ... y-of-tvrm/

http://chattanoogapulse.com/category/current-issue/

Also, tonight is the evening photo session at East Chattanooga. A few tickets are still available.

Friday evening update: http://tvrail.com/pages/tvrm-news-updates

Steve, great photos; you sure put in a long day.

Alan Maples

You mean a long holiday weekend. I guess I was keyed up on Saturday (understatement), but it caught up with me. Sorry for the lack of updates after the first...working on it now. What made it all worthwhile? Hanging out of that vestibule at 40mph on Sunday heading toward Citico Junction. Wow! What memories came crashing back! All of a sudden I was just a kid riding behind 4501 on the way to Emory Gap! Remarkable what a difference in 20mph can do...forgot how much I missed it.

Not my video, but take a look at this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g_QC-LP5Bns

Thank you Steve and everyone else at TVRM and Norfolk Southern for putting on a first class operation. Riding in the vestibule of the 2 pm trip on Sunday took me back to 1994 when I last had the opportunity to ride the NS mainline behind steam on 611's last journey from Greenville, SC to Asheville, NC via Saluda grade. I had the opportunity to meet many great people this weekend including: Bob Saxton, Adam Phillips, David Marshall among others and got to see my friend Trains editor Jim Wrinn as well.

I am very appreciative to TVRM president Tim Andrews giving an excellent extended shop tour on Saturday afternoon on the Missionary Ridge Local trip behind 6133. All-in-all it was a great weekend despite the heavy rain on Monday which caused a tree to fall across the Chattooga & Chickamauga on the return trip of the excursion powered by SR FP-7 6133 and SR GP30 2594. Lehigh Valley 126 did a great job as well and John Gramling definitely has another engine to be proud of. Seeing 630 on the mainline again this weekend was definitely the pinnacle of the weekend celebration and I enjoyed hearing Mr. Wick Moorman speak on Thursday evening. I am looking forward to the next public trips of the 21st Century Steam program.

Same here. I've done plenty of chasing both tourist and mainline, and riding tourist railroads since the Steam Program ended in '94, but being in that vestibule listening to the rapid-fire exhaust of 630 at mainline speed brought back a ton of memories. The trips may have been short, and the true high-speed part was a relatively short run, but NS and TVRM really outdid themselves in Chattanooga. For anyone that missed the NS Steam v1, this past weekend was as close as you can get, and all the cars (as far as I can tell) saw service with the steam program at one time or another. Here's hoping NS Steam v2 will long continue.





I was standing fairly close to where that video was shot, and let me tell you, the audio on that video does not do it justice. The sound was absolutely phenomenal, and you could hear it for a long time before it got there, and a long time after it passed by.
Kevin

Congrats to the TVRM!!!!!!! Is 630 a stoker feed or hand?

Unless they've changed her since my younger days, she's "manual fuel injection"

WOW!!! Hope they have a young buck doing the shoveling!