This D&M RS-2 makes me think. Here's a situation where (apparently) everyone has been caught off guard, surprise, a preservation-worthy unit is up for sale, need cash now. Doesn't seem to work very well.

But what about REAL preservation planning? How often do museums approach owners of historic units (or classes of units) and say "It is our intention to preserve one of these (or that one)" - and work it out in advance?

What's going to happen to the RS1325s? The last original BART cars? Detroit People Mover cars? Is anyone talking (today) with the owners about that?

Well, it's a nice idea. Our museum contacted a local road about a couple of first generation diesel switchers. Would they consider donating one? "No, they're both currently in active service." No assurance that when withdrawn from service, that they will let us know. We probably just have to hope that when the deed is done, we will be there at the right time.

A case in point. The Monon Railroad Historical-Technical Society requested that CSX advise them when the last ex-Monon C420 on the railroad was ready to be written off the roster. The MRHTS would like to acquire it (it was in storage at the time.) The next news that MRHTS got was from a member who happened to go by the yard where it was stored and found it cut down to the frame!

Les

I think this scenario is no different than that faced by railroad management in the steam era. Here is a chunk of steel worth $40,000, someone's salary for a year, a whole lot of Disneyworld trips, and they should donate it, why? Even if it is significant, how do you explain to the stockholders and employees' families the cash flow loss?

I recall the story of CNJ camelback 774 and how the author was offered the engine for $5,000, in 1950's dollars. What was that, a manager's salary back then? For cash tight CNJ, the thought process was probably, "How are we going to give this away and then cancel Christmas bonuses?" The same thinking probably doomed NYC Niagaras and Hudsons. It was the roads with lots of cash sloshing around that donated engines (UP, SP, GN, NP, CBQ) because they had profits that could benefit from tax deductions.

Steve.. Now that you brought it up I remember reading about the CNJ camelback 774 but that was a long time ago. Actually it was quite a sad story... Wasn't this story in an old trains magazine?

Thanks..
Jay

There are any number of locomotives and cars at RMNE that were "watched" for a while. Our NH FL9 2059 (MNCR 2033) took 18 years from the time it was promised to us as a donation (October 1984) until it finally arrived in the spring of 2003. It came out of service in late 1995. We watched the Amtrak RS-3 fleet dwindle down in 1985, and started fundraising so that we were ready with bucks in hand when the bid list went out late that summer. That's how NH 529 came to us. Many of our other diesels happened the same way.

Same thing with freight cars, although there were a few losses-- a MNCR VP-Mechanical Dept. donated a very nice, clean, straight NH early steel boxcar to us. I went back to Stamford to look at it two weeks later, and it was in the process of being loaded on a TTX flat to be shipped out as scrap!! EVERYTHING and I do mean ALL of it, had been cut off the underframe, sides and roof. ARRGGH! And we lost at least one CV 40' "door-and-a-half" auto boxcar before getting the one we have (not quite as nice as the one that got away).

The LSRC-D&M RS-2 sounds like a "target of opportunity" that came up unexpectedly. If there are things a group or museum wants, try to plan for it, and get a war chest together.

Howard P.

One program that has apparently been successful in the past--but various parties might deny ever existed if asked today--was an arrangement between CSX and the B&O Museum to designate items wanted for the Museum while still in use on the CSX system.

This arrangement supposedly came about after a badly botched attempt to preserve WM GP40 3798/CSX 6573, the last loco on CSX that retained WM paint. Supposedly, CSX had promised the loco for preservation, but it failed in "remote" Cincinnati, and by the time word of the retirement reached those who knew of the promise, the loch has supposedly lost its prime mover, traction motors, and much else.

In the wake of that boo-boo, CSX supposedly worked jointly with the B&O Museum and others (I believe there was overlap with the B&ORRHS) to produce a "master list" of assets where the Museum would get "right of first refusal" and CSX stenciled "DO NOT DISMANTLE" and information on where to send the retired piece if possible. As I recall, that stencil landed on everything from ex-B&O GP38 3802 (Trains' "All-American Diesel") to old freight cars used as storage to entire buildings, according to one list I once saw.

A decade or more later, on the one hand, we have many more items preserved that otherwise might have been wantonly scrapped, but we also have a yard full of unrestored relics cluttering southwestern Baltimore.

If I were to propose a similar system? Each railroad, large or small, gets ONE designated party to work with/for, and THAT party should work feverishly to get the pieces to the "best" home, which may or may not be themselves. Lay out appropriate terms in advance--do they want a donation? can they afford scrap value? F.o.b. nearest interchange point?

As an example, say Conrail was still around. Designate the RR Museum of Pa. as official representative. If RR Museum of Connecticut wants that New Haven RS3, petition RR Museum of Pa., they consult with Conrail and "make it so".

Stations? At the very least, a standardized form that says "these are the conditions upon which we will consider, and no other."

Of course, the standard today is at every big railroad's website: "The XYZ Railroad does not donate equipment or buildings to non-profits."