I just got back from attending the Railroad Passenger Car Alliance meeting in Morristown, NJ. Most of the value from this meeting (for me, anyway) was the contacts with others that I made. One of those contacts told me that they feel they get a lot more value out of their membership in AAPRCO. They have a less expensive membership for those who own non-Amtrak certified cars. This contact felt that the AAPRCO insurance program and contacts with the Class I freight carriers made joining a good idea even for companies like mine that generally lease cars to tourist railroads. Anyone care to add their opinions?

I just returned from this conference as well. I think most people expressed the opposite positions at this conference: the RPCA membership is less costly, and the RPCA insurance program is a major reason people join RPCA. (Granted, many people at this conference are RPCA members only so they may be a little biased.) Also, I am not aware of AAPRCO having great contacts with the freight carriers, especially when it comes to deadheading cars, which I assume most AAPROC members seldom if ever do. (Please correct me if I am wrong.)

On a separate note: why don't you post under your real name on this site? I may have sat next to you several times over the weekend and never knew who you were. There are several frequent posters on here and Trainorders.com who, judging from pictures and stories they posted, were in the next vestibule or next seat at conferences and conventions and I had no idea who they were.

Chris Jacks.

I'm sorry, but my business involves work with the National Park Service (Steamtown) and several for profit shortline railroads. If I used my real name it would prevent me from honestly commenting about certain topics I feel are important to railroad preservation.

It only costs $40.00 to join RPCA; and that gets you a full voting membership, as opposed to AAPRCO, where if you do not get at least a $300 membership, your vote is no good. Although I have done work for AAPRCO, I ceased my membership when my voting class was reduced to nothing.

That $40.00 also gets you into the RPC Numbering bureau for only $20 to regester your coach or whatever in UMLER, the AAR database, which is now requirted to move on almost any railroad. It also gets youinto the educational programs like the Air Brake certification at a discount. You can also get the members rates on borrowing wheel and coupler gages, and the use of the Single Car Test Devices for only $75.00/week.

I agree that there are no great deals between AAPRCO and the freight railroads that RPCA has not already accomplished.

AAPRCO has a half time employee in Washington whose function is to lobby Amtrak. RPCA does not have this, but this is one reason their dues are so high.

I am a past Director of RPCA, so perhaps I am biased!

Steve Zuiderveen

Just a point of information with regard to this thread:

On Page 77 of the current (Feb) TRAINS, is an article about the Tourist Railway Association, Inc. convention in Kansas City this past November 3rd thru the 7th. Among the items discussed were attendance, a poor economy, and insurance liability increases. The article then states that the TRAIN board has agreed to conduct a preliminary study of a combination among ARM, AAPRCO, RPCA and an informal groups of dinner-train operators. presumably abut the mentioned problems and other similar issues.

re: a study about combining AAPRCO, RPCA, ARM, TRAIN, etc: there was no mention of that at last week's RPCA conference, and I doubt that would ever happen for a long list of reasons.

However...I think a joint convention among these groups would be quite interesting. That also has issues, like the time of year (RPCA usually meets in January, AAPRCO in October, etc.) but I think that is much more doable than many think.

Chris Jacks.