Guys and Gals,

I read with great interest all the things getting scrapped that no one in the preservation community knew was about to be scrapped. I see requests for lists of the endangered to help avoid these atrocities in the future. With all due respect it looks like some folks are operating in a vacumn and the rest of us are supposed to point out potential scrappings to them. Perhaps a two page ad in Trains?

I offer this: both the MILW coaches and the 466 have been available for sale for at least two years. I wasn't looking to aquire either, but repeatedly heard scenarios from various sources of various people being interested, etc. I am convinced that if these three pieces could have been saved they would have been saved.

I know that the asking price on the Alco has always been high vs. its condition and demand for RS-2s. The two MILW coaches, well they were MILW coaches; a gorgeous interior in the second biggest POS carbody in postwar passenger construction (PS stainless over carbon being the worst). The ultimate "last straw" on the MILW cars was our friends at CSX, NREC roller bearings, and some idiot out there that used the wrong materials to service the bearings on one of his cars and then had the balls to blame CSX for the subsequent failure.

Simply put:

1) Just because you (whoever, not picking on anyone) didn't know it was going to be scrapped doesn't mean that nobody else did.

2) Somebody is always going to be the last person to know.

In the perfect world it would all get saved and restored. We don't live in the perfect world.


ETA

ETA,

It is a good point, but what I am about to say applies to museums or historical organizations that own railroad artifacts, including equipment. I believe the "best practices" scenario is for a museum to offer to transfer the equipment to another organization that has a plan to take care of it, and can remove it from the property. If that does not happen, then the museum can restart to selling or scrapping the equipment.

While you can't save everything, there are many options to scrapping the whole piece of equipment or to even saving the entire piece. Like the group that went out to CA to save interior parts and other components of the MILW coaches for use in future restoration projects.

I just feel it is shameful when a museum "poops in private" by scrapping equipment without offering it to a better home.

If a piece of equipment that is impossible to ship by rail and too large or heavy for highway movement has no way to leave a location other than being cut apart, there is also the option of doing a planned "scrapping" to highway transportable weights and dimensions and reassembling the equipment elsewhere. Obviously this is made much more feasible if the intent is to have a static display and there is no need to return the equipment to operation. This kind of relocation was one of the options "floated" a few years back for New York Central tugboat #16, which unfortunately ended up getting scrapped instead.

PC

Well, THEY WEREN'T OFFERED FOR SALE TO US.

The problem is, sir, you also live in a vacuum. You are only one segment of "preservation" and you also do not talk to the others.

Let me give you an example. ONE SEGMENT of preservation is this constellation of private collectors and brokers - Jerry Jacobsen, Doyle McCormack, Ozark Mountain, D.F. Barnhardt. And I'm happy for them-all being millionaires and stuff, but they have a buying power that nonprofit museums cannot duplicate, as a rule, and this tends to create a "Locomotive Bubble" just like the housing bubble. Oh look, Joe Collector just paid $75,000 for a historic diesel -- THEREFORE ALL HISTORIC DIESELS ARE WORTH $75,000.

The result is, anything "in the collector market" is priced out of reach of a railway museum that isn't incredibly desperate -- and this in turn has bred a hostile relationship between players in the collector market and nonprofit railway museums. Museums think the prices are unrealistic and think the players are hoping to lavishly profit off the sweat of the volunteers' brows. Meanwhile the collector market thinks railroad museums are just another customer; a penniless and arrogant one at that, always being "unrealistic" and wanting something for nothing.

Mind you a collector has a different view of "preservation" than the museum. The museum wants items safe in nonprofit hands where they're "owned" by a governing board and safe from bankruptcy or a collector's whims. The collector wants it "safe" on his PRIVATE property, not hopelessly out of his control at a railroad museum where any clown can get on the Board. Furthermore, both parties care about preservation, and each thinks the other a lousy steward; and there's something to be said for both views.

Anyway, the upshot is these communities rarely talk to one another. It would be an exercise in frustration, because there is such a mismatch between fundamental operating principles/points of view.


In the case of D&M 466, actually -- the previous owner and the scrapper BOTH tried fairly seriously to market the unit into "preservation", heh, heh, heh. But their idea of doing that was to talk to private collectors and brokers, and that messaging did not propagage to the railroad museums that had a real shot at preserving the unit.



Oh yeah, I forgot to mention. Another cultural difference between the collectors and the museums is that the collector still expects to move everything by rail, becasuse he usually exists on the general system and limits his scope of collection to mainline-suitable equipment. Whereas the museums are entirely accustomed to moving things by truck; for three reasons; first because their prizes are not rated for the draft/buff forces in modern freight trains; second they are not fit for interchange and museums could care less if they ever are; and third because the museum itself is often landlocked.

The difficulty of making 466 fit for interchange was one of the "coffin nails" for 466; as the owner (solely operating in his own vacuum) decided that made it unlikely to be preserved.

One additional factor that is going to have a noticable effect on the cost of preservation in the future is the emissions "break" line. "Popular" pre-1973 locomotives that are still readily supportable in the parts market are seeing astronomical increases in value, to the point where some pre-1973 EMD products are worth more than they sold for new. Shortlines and regionals in particular are watching for them because they can be exempt from requirements for expensive emissions upgrades.

Ideally you would think that this should not effect the pricing of other less supportable units out there, where parts availability is an issue and a contributing factor to their retirement. But reality is that with one segment of the pre-1973 production appreciating in value, a perception sets in that anything that old must have similar value.

PC

Well, let's see what a 1965 Mustang or Dodge Dart, or 1957 Ford or Chevy or 1968 Cadillac or 1976 Volkswagen Rabbit, brings today, compared to its original price, and how the cost of a new car today compares to the cost of a comparable new car from back then, adjusted for inflation.



No.

You have a "historic" diesel? It's worth exactly what you can get some shmuck to pay for it. No more, no less. That particular locomotive (or caboose or freight car or passenger car or whatever) you may lust after may be arguably "historic," but that realistically isn't going to translate into any additional dollar value.

That "first RS2"/"first road switcher"? So, where's the first RS1 built? The first RS3? The last Alco? First GE road locomotive? We've been lucky enough to grab a FEW of the "historic" locos (such as the last FT's), but we're not getting them all, nor should we. We just don't have the room or the resources.

It sounds to me like I'm hearing someone making a case for the premise that an owner of a piece should be required to turn it over to future historians and custodians gratis just because they declare it "historic". That's not the way it works, folks. What you do is that you make the case, through your actions, track record, and salesmanship, that the artifact in question is indeed historic, and furthermore that your group or institution is a worthy enough future owner/custodian of an artifact that a current owner believes you worthy of a donation, a price break, transportation to a new home, a waiver to normal operation protocol, or whatever.

At absolute best, you can argue whether or not a potential seller has made enough notice that a particular supposedly "historic" item is "available." Where are we going to draw the line here? Should I require that they run an ad in Trains and R&R? What about the NRHS newsletter? eBay? Craigslist? No. If you believe an artifact is "historic" and worthy of preservation, you HAVE to be proactive. You hunt down the owner, and you make a firm offer in writing that you are interested. You sit down and find out what they want to know. Submit an annual letter of intent? Make a token down payment? Buy right of first refusal? Make the case that your museum is worthy of the costs of donation?

Now, if someone comes back and says "We submitted several letters of intent and had $50,000 in the bank, with another $75K pledged to the cause, and they didn't call us when they made the decision....", THEN you can get upset. Which is why you get started on the Amtrak AEM-7 and SD80MAC preservation fund NOW, not when the last one is being picked apart at Wilmington or Pielet Brothers or Naporano or Cycle Systems.....

"Well, THEY WEREN'T OFFERED FOR SALE TO US.

The problem is, sir, you also live in a vacuum. You are only one segment of "preservation" and you also do not talk to the others."

Well, you assume to know an awful lot about me. I don't talk to everyone and for the most part don't broadcast what folks have for sale, but I do talk to a wide variety of the "segments" since my job and my hobby do intersect. As I said, I had no interest in the 466, but I was aware of it from at least 3 independent sources. Because you didn't know what was happening doesn't mean it wasn't shopped around and made available to all. If you fault the owners for not giving it away, well they do have a business to run (perhaps nationalized railroads would fix this problem) and contrary to popular belief they are still expected to post a profit (damned stockholders).

One other random thought; If preserving the first road switcher (and yes I'll ignore the RS-1 argument for a minute) is a priority, you and every other preservation entity have had since 1946 to plan for its acquisition and preservation. That's 65 years to figure it out financially and patiently follow it until the day its owner decides to retire it. That's a 64 year and 9 month head start on the scrapper. If we loose to the scrapper then I maintain that for the most part that's nobody's fault but our own.

ETA

ETA provides a very valid point about preservationists planning for future acquisitions. I happen to know of more than one organization that has done just that and, as a result, things have been saved.

Mike

Just because you heard about it from 3 sources, doesn't mean everyone heard it from 1!

If anything, that reflects a tight connectedness in your communities (noting that you are in more than one), which supports my theory about isolated segments (enclaves) who talk within each enclave but not much outside.

Enclaves are not bad; they're simply the nature of how humans socialize. Birds of a feather. I hope you didn't take insult from calling out this social phenomenon; none was intended; at least no more than that intended by calling me "the last to know" :)

Here, test your connections. Without doing research, can you just name one person associated with: Illinois Railway Museum? Monticello? MOT? Age of Steam? Little River? Saginaw Valley? Michigan Transit Museum? Bluewater? Adrian/Blissfield? The Bluebird? Southern Michigan? Noblesville? French Lick? Cuyahoga Valley? Larry's Truck? That's a bit of variety in types of organizations, most of whom might have an interest in an Alco in Michigan.

See what I mean? I bet some are in your enclaves, others are outside it, and others you never heard of! (or didn't recognize the informal name). No harm no foul, but this is the reality of social communication.

And that is a reality we must contend with if we aim to save these types of unit in the future. Because very often the best preserver of a unit will not be in the same enclave as the owner.


What you're saying -- applies in BOTH directions. Museums can pay their own way or they shouldn't exist. But profiteering off a nonprofit charity isn't right either. You shouldn't "hold a torch to a unit" and try to extort more money out of a nonprofit "or we'll scrap it to spite you".

And maybe I underestimate scrap value, but it kinda seems like that's what happens. If they can net $20,000 by scrapping a unit, they're going to hold out for $60,000 right up until the end, lest they be thought of as "soft" the next time they're wheeling and dealing.


I completely agree. This is largely our fault. We didn't care enough to make the right contacts, get the right handshakes and get the unit on more favorable terms, and indeed we had - well not 60 years but certainly 5 years to do that. Having not done it, trying to do it at 11:59 is just madness. It'll cost more and be more risky.

I hope if 466 gives anything to preservation, it is the lesson.

Were any parts salvaged from these units? Im sure they were full of un-obtainium.

Mostly foamer collectibles, horns, number plates, all that sort of thing.

For more on the unit, check the Dec. 22 post by "Notch 8" here, where he quotes Ed Bowers, who was the primary private collector who was interested in the unit and had inspected vis-a-vis his one single perspective. http://railroadfan.com/phpbb/viewtopic. ... 40#p203151

Talk about "operating in a vacuum".

So, Ed evalutes it, decides its too much money for his taste, arranges to salvage some parts for the future after the scrapper buys it to cut, and Ed is in a vacumn?

Fascinating.

One thing I find from time to time is the situation of "Why didn't you know about it, I knew it was there, so why should I have told you." Or some variation on that thought line.

In one case it was a clapboard-covered box car offered to the Nevada State RR Museum. The staff went out looking at it expecting to find it no a railroad car; but returned excited that it was a relatively well preserved car. One of the volunteers said that he had know about it for years; but had never thought to mention it. The donation was accepted.

Another story that I heard is that a scrap yard in Utah had for decades after abandonment two complete interurbans that apparently were being used for storage space. A railfan would drive by about every few months to check and see it they were still there. Then one time he drove by and the cars were gone -- the roofs had finally deteriorated and the yard decided to scrap them. Only after that did a southern California traction museum learn of the cars existence that overlapped its own. If it had known, it would have mounted a campaign to obtain these cars.

We all need to share and talk. And encourage others to do the same.