Name and Number of nee-NYC Sleeper Lounge (?) at RCT&HS

Tom Cornillie · **Posted:** Sat Jun 03, 2006 3:23 pm

Hello all

What is the name and number of this nee-New York Central passenger car, which appears to be a sleeper-lounge?

The photo is from this great collection of photos, which also has photos from the Cape May Seashore Lines and the Danbury Railroad Museum - which are relatively difficult to find up-to-date images of

http://www.transitspot.com/gallery2/v/u ... chuchubob/

Best regards,
Tom Cornillie

Howard P. · **Posted:** Sat Jun 03, 2006 9:59 pm

"Mountain Stream" was the NYCS name. It was the only one of the "Stream"-series 6-double bedroom lounge cars that did not go to Amtrak in 1971. It had been converted about 1964-65 to a commuter service bar car, with the lounge containing a long stand-up bar, two bedrooms removed, one converted to bar service space, and the remaining three combined into a card-playing room with tables and chairs, entered off the side aisle. The NYC number was 659, the PC-CR-MNCR number was 4423. It ended up with Metro-North and was acquired by RMNE in 1993, and was sold in 1999 to persons associated with the RDG group. It still had the original steam heat, generator-battery 64 volt DC electricals, etc.

The cars were built in 1949, and were assigned to Southwestern Ltd., New England States, etc.

HP

Tom Cornillie · **Posted:** Tue Jun 06, 2006 2:05 pm

Dear Howard,

Thank you for that quick and very informative response. It sounds like a very snappy car - I would very much like to hear what its current owner has planned for it.

Tom Cornillie

Topfuel · **Joined:** Sun Aug 29, 2004 4:49 pm **Posts:** 529

There are some sources that indicate that this car may have retained it's more or less as-built interior, including the 6 bedrooms, until the late 70's. Can anyone confirm this? Unfortunately, though the description of the present-day interior by Howard P. is accurate, the net result is that the beautiful and very functional original interior was essentially gutted for use as a commuter bar car. It's a shame they didn't take a coach and make it into a bar car instead of butchering one of these fine Stream series cars.

Also, as a small addition to Howard's comments, one other Stream car did not go to Amtrak - the Rainbow Stream was sold to Sonora Baja California circa late 60's. As far as is known, the car still exists down there.