In follow up to my earlier post. The point I am trying to make is that much of the URHS collection must be placed under cover very soon if it is to have any chance of being preserved. This is a place where ideas are important part in devising a feasable plan. In order to do this, more information needs to be made available about the URHS and the New Jersey's railroad preservation environment. As I see it, it starts with finding answers to the following questions:What is the organization's attitude toward its unrestored equipment? What has been done so far to stabilize the equipment that awaits restoration? What plans have been tried and failed? Are there opposing view points that have gridlocked forward motion?This board has many good examples of how such topics can be discussed in an informative and civil manner. Having a better understanding of what is going on in New Jersey will go far in bringing forward new ideas that address the current situation. Tom Cornillie

To follow up on a previous theme:My personal impression of the various "TEA" pig-troughs........ excuse me, grant monie--is that the money can be applied to any--yes, just about any--conceivable "improvement to surface transportation." For example, I could apply for money to restore a rail station as a bus station. Or a travel agency and visitors center. Or a skateboard shop. I could apply to get the Hickory Creek running, or to restore rail service to the Delaware Water Gap or downtown Durango, or even Mt. Union on three-foot wheels. I could apply to restore a vintage trolley to city tourist service, or even as a potentially demonstrable museum exhibit with ten feet of track. But I probably could NOT apply for money to shelter derelict preserved rolling stock, because the shed itself doesn't roll or provide a "transport service".IF URHS applied for this money for the Hickory Creek, it was available and applicable under the terms of the program, and that was about the only real URHS project to which TEA money was applicable, then my problem is definitely not with URHS, it's with that damned pork barrel of tax monies.We can (and most likely will) argue over the merits and failings of these programs until the cows come home without resolving anything. All I know is, I'd feel a H*** of a lot better about applying for a grant for a project like the restoration of ATSF 2926 or a Pullman day coach from a dedicated heritage/history preservation trust fund or money pool (such as Britain's Heritage Lottery Trust) than I would applying for a "transportation efficiency grant" for the same. I'd like to think I have some shred of integrity........

The “TEA” grant process and eligible projects has changed over the years, so this may not still be true, but the group at Laws California used TEA money to build a car shop.Here near San Francisco much of the TEA money has gone for public art in transit stations. At least one grant was made to rebuild a publicly owned building which opened as a brewpub. The funding process has been highly political, and to some extent quite opaque. Funds are more likely to be used by one of the large transit organizations, with nothing left over for preservation grants to museums. As with any complicated, politicized process, it may be too difficult for many volunteer based groups.

In California it is political and locally political. Since the first tea grants the distribution process has moved from the state level to the local level. In some cases the local level is by county or maybe multiple counties (California has something like 54 counties).The county I am aware of is Riverside County because that is the one in which Orange Empire is located. The County transportation commission was allocated a certain amount of money to distribute by CalTrans (California DOT). The Riverside County Transporation Commission (RCTC) received applications for various projects from highway landscaping, bike paths, local roadway improvements, bus stop shelters and a depot rehabilitation project. To sort these out and prioritize the RCTC created an advisorary group made up of the city engineers of the cities within the county and maybe the county engineer. The city engineers created a priority list that went to the RCTC which was made up of county supervisors and city mayors. The end result was that every policitical jurisdiction in Riverside County received at least one project and they were allocated by population, etc. Then along the way CalTrans had to review and approve the project documents. The depot restoration project sat for months on the desk of a bureaucratic underling who felt he had to request revisions, but could never get it off of his desk. Finially with just days to spare (in a multi-year time line) CalTrans approved the project. And all the while we have inflation. Urrrgggg!!!!!I suspect that Inyo County (were the Laws musuem is located) received a certain amount of money and then used some political process to decide were to spend it. The Laws musuem site is owned by Inyo County.

I don't normally comment publicly on the URHS. But I was a delegate to the URHS from 1989 through 1993 so I can give a little background to the thinking then.Initially, there was a state appointed commission that recommended (with URHS blessing) that a state museum be located in Flemington, home of the Black River & Western tourist railroad. This commission "sunseted" and there was a fair amount of local opposition. The URHS then focused on the concept of a "museum train" - one or more cars that would be a rolling display of NJ transportation history. The first car selected for this was a Budd built former New York Central tavern-lounge car. The next effort was to raise money and publicity by sponsoring excursions. The excursion all ran on NJTransit lines. This was when the decision was made to paint two E-8's into Erie colors. I know this was not an instant decision. There was a lot of pro and con discussion but in the end it was looked upon as an attraction that would gain publicity, riders for the trips and money. The ex-CNW F units were leased to Metro North and part of the deal was to repaint them at the end of the lease as URHS requested.As I recall the first few years saw the excursions make decent money. There were also volunteers working on equipment each week. Much of this work was short term stablization as the belief was a permanent site was only a couple of years away. While this was going on one of the RDC's (ex-NYS&W M-1) was leased to one of the member groups to restore and operate.After a while the excursions seemed to drop off in popularity. There were two general theories. First was that the routes you could travel on NJT were "boring" - with the exception of the 90 mile run to Port Jervis, NY. There wasn't much you could do about that as there weren't too many other alternatives available. The second theory was that offering trips in NJT equipment was not historical and did not attract riders. The thought was to restore a number of former Great Northern (and other) smooth side coaches that had last been used on the New York & Long Branch (NJT's North Jersey Coast Line). It was at about this time I ceased being a delegate.Since then some number of these cars have been restored. I know they have run on several excursions and some are now leased to the Cape May Seashore Lines (along with RDCs and diesels). I know that another commission was seated that picked Phillipsburg as the "official" site - but with no state money to go with it.I cannot comment on what decision were made after 1993, but at the time the philosophy was to hold everything together for a few years until a site was selected and construction completed.Tim Stuy