A little history if I may.

The Pemberton Township Historic Trust in Pemberton NJ is housed in an old Pennsylvania RR station that was restored in '95. This station was part of the PRR railyard complex. On our site is a restored section house, the old telegraph shed, the original two place outhouse that was located in a blueberry bog, the foundation for the hustlers house and next door in a property we wish to acquire, the old yard complete with 60' Armstrong turntable pit, and all of the ties still in the ground. There are also building foundations for the hay press building, general store, bike shop, coffee shop, lumberyard and a building that was used during WWII to build prefabricated housing for the military around the world. That building will become our museum. That is if we can get the property away from Wawa who for those of not from around here is a convenience store chain that gets everything they want by intimidation through litigation. They have a store across the street from the property but want to build a Super Wawa which is a store with gas pumps. Now the ground they currently own has more room than they need for the superstore but they want the old yard property so they can keep the current store opened and operating while they build the new facility. But if they get the yard, the history will be gone, forever! We have spent a lot of our money on fighting them at the township level and lost that round becasue the township sees "rateables". They are now dragging their feet on getting their approvals together since they have an option on the property. We feel that we can win at the county and/or state level because they realize the historic value of the property and that we can draw tourists to the area which Wawa couldn't do but will definitely benefit from. But that takes time and money and they are banking on us running out of both.

Our plan is to restore the yard and we have approval to lay 2.5 miles of track on the rail trail and run an excursion line. We have four cabooses, an N5C, N6B, NX23 and something that is unidentifiable. Also on site is a hopper, gondola, flatcar and our 100 ton GE diesel that we hope to have running real soon.

But first we have to wrestle the ground away from Wawa or our dreams are in danger of fading away. We can put in the excursion line on what we currently have but we need the museum space as our station is full and we have material in storage in several other locations. We also want to put all of the buildings back just as they were in the late 1800s early 1900s. When (and if) we get the yard, we will lay the rail just like it was and have a shop to do our restorations as well as a real honest to goodness operating rail yard just like it was way back when. Right now we are doing all of the restoration work outside and it is difficult painting in the winter!

Later!
Mr. Ed