A bit of the proverbial fecal matter is hitting the propeller as I type over my previously post about two passenger cars being scrapped in Pennsylvania.

Meanwhile, I'm juggling contacts over another opportunity going knocking.

Without going into details over either case here:

1) There was apparently some question (which will no doubt end up in court) over whether the company that scrapped the cars attempted to contact the cars' owners. It could well be a case, much like a story recounted here a while back of a renegade tow truck operator that tried to take a former military truck off someone's front yard, that they simply "declared it abandoned" and took matters into their own hands. Exacerbating the matter seems to be TWO changes of ownership of the company that had a lease on the adjacent property.

I know of LOTS of equipment, from boxcars and cabooses to passenger cars, locomotives, and cars loaded with parts, all stored on various sidings, short term or long term, formally or not.
If you have such a situation, is there a way for any party that may have a need to find the owner to find you? A county or city inspector, a police officer, a fire department, a property assessor, a Census enumerator, the power company, whoever? Is there a sign posted somewhere asserting ownership, and more importantly is that sign maintained as legible?

2) If an "emergency" or other opportunity arises, is there a way to contact you, and more importantly, does the party that is reached have a way for SOMEONE to show up promptly, or even just answer the phone?

I have a situation right now where I have someone saying to me "I have a car/loco/engine/parts that the XY&Z Railroad could desperately use, and they're about the only ones who have any use for these specific parts, but I can't get anyone to answer the phone."
I contacted a mutual associate, and he said "He NEVER answers his phone or returns calls, The ONLY thing you can do is go to an operating day and hope he's there to talk to."
(This would explain a LOT about the past 20 years at that place. And this also sounds like a couple late eccentrics well known in this field, who ended up with not-very-nice things happening to their stuff.)

I had another situation where someone was looking to donate an entire modular building to a museum group for workshop/storage--big enough to hold eight locomotives with elbow room for machinery! They needed a place for it to go by the "end of next month or it would be scrapped," and they just barely managed to get it in time because of missed communications. (In the end, it was just too big for the property they could put it on, so they sold it commercially as an industrial building kit, and used the proceeds to build the shop they needed.)

Yes, we're volunteers. Yes, we have jobs and lives. But can someone be located within the ranks to be the closest one there? A retiree down the road, a neighbor, the "shop guy" who lives closest?
There is one preservation group to which I belong where one "officer's" sole position is "Property Manager," or more realistically, "the guy down the street with the key to the building." He opens for meetings and open days, answers if the security alarm goes off or if locals have questions............. and that's about it.

An organization might be reachable, but that doesn't guarantee, by purpose or accident, that the information will get to the right person, in a timely manner.

Very good advice. I used to have a stencil with my name and contact number that I would spray onto any piece of equipment that I owned. These days one could get vinyl decals with the same info. to put on their equipment.

Put a camera up!!

I would paint anything that is at any risk or anything where the existing paint isn't special.

Put a GPS tracker in anything that might be at risk. Many GPS trackers have vibration detectors and aux inputs for something like door alarms.

If you have AC power and internet available, put a camera up. PUT A CAMERA UP. You don't need a building, I've seen a router and modem crammed into old fridges and coolers, or use a JobBox for something more robust.

Put a camera up!!

Someone just stole a bridge, again. Nothing is -really- safe. Thieves now drive white trucks, with amber lights, and they wear hard hats and orange vests. NO one will stop them except you. Your neighbors will wander over while you are staring at your empty track or ruined car, and say "I saw you had some work done on that car the other day...."

Put a camera up!!!

"The Importance of Being Reachable" is one of the lesser known works of Oscar Wilde.

Make sure the cops know who to get hold of right away, too. It doesn’t matter whether the emergency is theft, fire or what, they need to be able to ask questions and get in when necessary or they may have to break in where you wish they didn’t. “We were chasing a guy and he jumped your fence” is too common an occurrence.

If the fire department has a key box at your place, make sure you point it out during annual inspection because there may be new hires who need to know.

Local scrapyards and pawn shops are another place to make contact way before you need them. “Hey, Light Fingered Louie just brought in some funny-looking parts...” may stop the next three truckloads from leaving your yard. Maybe five years ago, two guys s topped along Ohio Route 7 at rush hour, got out of their truck and started chucking tie plates into the bed. They had hauled off one load and come back for another before the cops got there to stop them. They tried to say they didn’t know anybody still owned the railroad.

Related to Becky Morgan's post, another good idea is to create a floor plan of your shop(s) for the Fire Department. Include the location of combustibles and what they are, oxygen/acetylene tanks, rubber tires, etc., etc. etc. Protect the fire fighters and yourself.

If you leave property (railroad car, auto, etc) on someone else's land for an extended period of time, even with a lease, you need to keep in touch and be reachable. The Portland, OR chapter of the NRHS "loaned" a 150 ton wrecker to a local short line. The railroad changed hands and the new management had the crane scrapped. They had no idea they didn't own it.