It looks as if it is on display as post-modern art.

Photo location is on the MC line just a block or so to the West of the Ann Arbor Amtrak station.

At one time there was a coal dock here, the photo shows what's left.

Thanks for posting it.

Bob H

OA -

I can't quite make out the lettering on the side of the hopper. Doesn't appear to be an Ann Arbor car. Did you happen to get the reporting marks and road number? I agree that the display is both interesting and unusual. Perhaps we should start a thread on unusual rail preservation projects. I have one that I could add!

Thanks for finding the car and posting the photo.

Les

Here are some other hoppers at a coke oven museum.

http://www.cityofchickamaugageorgia.org/cokeovens.htm

Richard Wilkens

I may not know "art", but I know what I like!

That is pretty neat. I would like to see more development projects re-use or retain the monuments of an earlier industrial age. This strategy establishes a connection to the past, creates interesting juxtapositions, and prevents this development from becoming a part of the cookie-cutter landscape of mediocrity.

I also like the rust. It is real, and shows its passage through time. It will probably need to be repainted eventually, but it looks fine for now.

That hopper is lettered for Detroit and Mackinac.

Very cool! Thanks for posting.

Another couple pictures for those of us who are curious enough to not be satisfied with one picture:

http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&source= ... .7,,0,0.81

Or, for a nice aerial view:

http://www.bing.com/maps/?v=2&where1=42 ... &encType=1

We'd heard inquiries about this in the past, but I didn't know it actually happened. A few years ago one of our Ann Arbor directors told us a commercial real-estate firm wanted a hopper car. I heard they also wanted a steam engine, so we steered `em to Honest Nick's used-0-8-0 lot, but obviously that never happened.

The hopper definitely lends meaning to the coalyard trestle. I have seen a similar installation of a hopper somewhere in western Illinois, at an aggregates company, although without the elevated track.

Aarne Frobom
Found Sculpture, Michigan

Sometimes these sort of displays border on stupidity. I was really surprized a couple years ago to come upon this:



This is over the Rock River in Beloit WI, a couple blocks from the old Fairbanks Morse plant. I'm sure the idea was to honor the locomotive builder while not blocking the bike path now on the bridge deck, but why? Now no one can inspect the artifact, which isn't complete and I suspect is only the body shell, and it's going to be costly when it's time to repaint it. Meanwhile, it doesn't properly illustrate the previous use of the bridge... "Mommy, how did the train get up there? Much better if it was under a pavailion in the adjacent park, to my way of thinking.

Don't get all bent out of shape, I believe if you look closely, you will see that the F-M unit is a replica. I remember reading about it in Trains. It's well done and "no historic artifacts were harmed in the creation of this replica."

I am sure that the "FM switcher" replica is a lot lighter than a real locomotive. Reminds me of the bascule bridge in San Francisco that now has a styrofoam "counterweight" over the roadway while the real counterweight is below the deck. Earthquake precautions vs. historic preservation.

If that's the case (and I'll admit, I haven't looked closely) then they really missed a bet... they could have placed the locomotive sculpture at the proper height on the bridge deck, inside the truss, and just provided an opening at each end so the bikes could pass through. They even could have put seat boxes by the cab windows so little kids could pretend they were the crew... Oh, I forgot, kids don't pretend anymore, they just immerse themselves in "virtual reality."

I suspect that's not an Ann Arbor gondola, since the coal tipple was served by Conra--Michigan Central.

That F-M on the bridge... now that's a serious call for one of those model-loco sound systems, amplifier and a solar panel! Maybe you could get the number lights to light up too!