It's not going to happen. The reason that the railroad shut down is that they no longer could use the right of way that they had been built on. It had belonged to the development company that built up the area and the railroad was part of it. The land has been sold, and the LK&P could not come to an agreement with the new owners.

A couple of years ago the whole LK&P was being offered as a single lot by Ozark Mountain. All to be picked up and removed.

I also had been told that the Hawaiian Railway Society at Ewa on Oahu was desirous of obtaining the Pymouth diesel as it had been Oahu Ry #45.

Is there a map that shows both the land lost to development, and the developed areas that burned? Maybe an opportunity exists, or a new path for a ROW.

That’s what my thought was - or similar to that. This obviously would not be the way you’d want this result to come about - but maybe the developer feels differently about the area now that this tragedy occurred.

Well, the LK&P is truly finished. Pictures out of Hawaii show the two 2-4-0s having been cut up, the Plymouth diesel has had the engine ripped out of it, and rails are being lifted.

More info:

https://www.facebook.com/groups/4100168 ... 0697976728

Allegedly the Hawaii Railroad Society is pursuing 0-6-2T #5 (the only original Hawaii steamer there) and the remains of diesel #45.

The Hawaiian Railroad Society (Ewa) have the Plymouth, and it has been moved off the property. They are not pursuing the 0-6-2t, but note it has been moved. They were trying to get other parts (trucks, draft gear) but those may have been swept up in the scrapping. They are planning a cosmetic restoration of the Plymouth, to display it with OR&L's first locomotive, held in their collection... so they will hold the first and last locomotives of the railroad.

One unconfirmed report suggest the scrapping was the result of an insurance settlement... a beauracratic way to clean the books.

On the NG board was posted this statement:

"The prior owners of this equipment had put a stipulation that all of the other railroad infrastructure would need to be removed as part of the purchase. This made even a “free” offer very expensive. There are rails in pavement, a large trestle, and other infrastructure that would be hard and expensive to remove. And you are on an island… how do you “dispose” of all the creosoted timbers from the trestle? And the crossties? HI has become very sensitive to the environmental impacts of industrial activities and waste. Easy 10M cleanup, and then everything is still on an island where no one, with means wants it. They were gone before the first fire, sadly."

I doubt that it was the shipping cost for the locomotives to the mainland that was the fatal issue.

That explains a lot.

If you receive an insurance payment for one million dollars, but then you sell the asset for one hundred thousand dollars, the insurance company is right to ask whether you really should have received the million dollars.

Was the asset really worth what the insurer paid for it?