From a post on steamboats.org:I work for BellSouth and we are looking to book railroad sleeper cars or a Boat/Barge to house our repairman during the restoration effort from Hurricane Katrina. (somewhere near New O'leans)Would you know if there is any company that you book with that will rent/lease us a one or two of the above mentioned crafts. We would only need them to be dock or put on a side track for an extended period. We will furnish all the necessities (all we need is a place to sleep at night while restorations are going on).If you have any ideas or know any contacts that might help - please contact Ronnie Mcfarland or anyone in the Emergency Control Center for BellSouth. (404-986-5505)I will be out of the office supporting Disaster restoration from hurricane Katrina. I will be checking my open mail but if this message is urgent and concerns MTR please call your Departmental MTR Coordinator first or the MTR Support Group at 502-582-8770 or 888-281-0118. I can be reached at the numbers below and will return all messages ASAP.Thanks in advance for your help. RonnieOffice - 205-977-0101Ipage - RMCFARLAND3Cell - 205-613-6524Don't flame at me re: viability of Mr. McFarlands proposal. Just call him if you have any serious inquiries or referrals.Thanks.Wesley

How about some boxcar conversions like the World War II Troop sleepers,but this time with an air conditioner unit to stick in one of the windows when the car is locked down for camping?Maybe even the government could look into a project of buying a fleet of boxcars to convert into tempoary living quarters with bunk beds for future refugees of any future catastrophe.My idea is that the boxcar sleepers ( and I mean hundreds of cars)could be placed in some central reserve for potential emergency use.When the need arose they could be quickly readied and sent out in trains of say up to a hundred cars.In the region outside of the disaster a flat field area could be be laid with panel track side by side like a railyard and the cars put in for a tempoary housing community.Electricity or generators could be wired up to provide heat and air.And when the crisis is over the cars would be rounded up and returned to the central reserve area. In the current situation I would have the railcar camps at strategic locations from Texas to Florida.To me this would seem like a better alternative them putting people in places like the superdome or astrodome.I know I will probably get blasted for this idea but in this post 9/11 ever more dangerous world there needs to be more creative thinking to take care of displaced people than has been seen in the past week.

Hmmmmmmm........ and we just found a whole bunch of Amtrak ExpressTrak boxcars and reefers in dead storage...........[scoots idea over to planning bosses..........]Now, add to this some redundant bilevel commuter cars (already found and pledged) to run these folks from the storage/camp areas to the reconstruction zones, with a boxcar with a HEP power plant supplying the light and AC. Hell, since the bilevels already have working AC, why not just take out the seats for the time being and use them as sleeping space?

A few of the eastern railroads once used modular units mounted on flatcars. I do not know if any railroad still uses this style camp train but you may be able to rent one if they are not currently using them. I suggest you call the big roads and see what they say. If all else fails you could get some flatcars spotted on a siding and put some units on them. Of course it may be simpler to rent the units and have them delivered by truck to a central location. The set up work required would be about the same but the transportation potentially much faster.John Bohon