North Texas Historic Transportation, Inc. in Fort Worth picked up a bunch of parts that will be used on the restoration of the NTT No. 560 Birney that we are restoring. A big thanks to Bradley Martin and the Fort Smith Trolley for help in acquisition of the parts. Top on the list is that we finally have a forklift that we have needed in our warehouse for so long. The little red Clark forklift is coming to Texas. The dismemberment of LSE is a tough thing, but through its end a lot of other organizations are being helped along and for that we are thankful.

I spoke briefly to the Chief Operating Officer of the McKinney Avenue Transit Authority in Dallas a while ago and he said they ended up buying the ex-Boston ex-Dallas PCC car from National Capitol Trolley Museum. It will be good to see a double-ended Dallas PCC back in Dallas, finally.

Parts are not the only thing that have been moving out of the warehouse. Two Shaker PCC's, 71 and 76, belonging to Electric City have been moved to NORM by Jim Lilly for temporary storage. More in another dispatch on news related to this move. On Sunday Night Silk Road arrived with three trucks. They loaded Shaker (Minneapolis) PCC 63 for its trip to IRM. Toronto PCC 4602 and Boat Car 606 were loaded for their trip to NCTM. All three trucks are expected to be on the road Monday.

Steve Heister
Northern Ohio Railway Museum
http://www.northernohio.railway.museum

At 11:00 a.m. I stopped by NCTM on the way out of town and saw TTC 4602 and BTS 606 (boat car) sitting on their rigs in the driveway waiting to be unloaded.

Who's next?

Wesley

The parlor car "Toledo" is scheduled to be loaded on Tuesday 11/24 and delivered to Pennsylvania Trolley Museum late that day. Unloading and a truck swap (it's std. ga, we are not) will take place the morning of Wed. 11/25. It'll be temporarily perched on a pair of Brill MCB trucks from a Red Arrow center door car.

Box motor 100 is tentatively scheduled to move to PTM on that same schedule one week later. PTM will render it for parts on behalf of another car in our collection. The body may be preserved elsewhere, and there's interest in the trucks too, which are of no immediate use to PTM (wrong gauge).

These acquisitions have resulted in three cars, two PCCs and a Red Arrow "Louie," being tarped and moved outdoors. There are plans under development for another car storage building with the aim of erecting it in 2011.

Check us out at www.pa-trolley.org

Thanks,
Dave Hamley, for PTM

The next car to move to the Northern Ohio Railway Museum is not a trolley, but a caboose. Norfolk and Western #518021, a 1914 wooden caboose, is scheduled to move on November 23. On December 1, lightweight smoker #303 moves followed by Shaker #1225 on December 3. For more on these acquisitions, follow this link: http://www.trainweb.org/norm/carfund.htm

Plans are being finalized for move of the OX and Airporter #172. The same goes for our two truck trailers of parts, Peckham trucks, rail and the substation equipment.

Steve Heister
Northern Ohio Railway Museum
http://www.northernohio.railway.museum

A good article about the Toledo private car from Cleveland acquired by the Pennsylvania Trolley Museum. Click on the photo in the article to bring up a 13 photo slide show.
http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsbu ... 55326.html

Last I heard, it was "no sale" on the 100's carbody, so that it looks as if PTM will have to dismantle it.

As of 7PM Sunday 11-29-09 Boxmotor 100 was loaded on the trailer and ready for Monday's trip to PTM. Cleveland Railway Trailer 2365 and Bluebird Rapid Car 113 were also loaded on to their trailers for their trip to Maine. On Monday 11-30-09 the Northern Ohio Railway Museum will be working with local hauler G&M to move a pair of Peckham trucks, pile of rail, the substation equipment and Airporter 172 to the Museum. This may overflow into Tuesday depending on how quickly things go. On Wednesday 12-2-09 Shaker 303 moves to NORM followed by Cleveland Railway 1225 on Thursday 12-3-09. On Friday 12-4-09 the ex CUT tower car moves to New York. That will leave only Vera Cruz 9, various loose parts and parts trailers at Dock 32.

Steve Heister
Northern Ohio Railway Museum
http://www.northernohio.railway.museum

I can confirm that the plan to bring the Iowa Southern 100 body back to Iowa unfortunately is indeed dead.

The Monroe County Historical Society announced that after their most recent board meeting they had decided to scuttle the entire project, stating "The project was too big, with not enough to show for it". The person close to the scene that I received my report from stated that he got the distinct impression it might have been a different scenario with a passenger car, as opposed to a box motor,,ie,
something more people could relate to.

Perhaps, the upcoming winter months might buy a bit of time for another interested party to drum up support,, unless they're in a big hurry to scrap the car for the mechanicals ?

In related news,, the Fox River Trolley Museum is looking for a new home for Johnstown Traction 362, which was moved out of their carbarn for the first time in roughly a quarter century on Saturday. The car will remain outdoors for the immediate future as that space is now occupied by recent LSE acquistion, Fox River/Shaker Hts 304. There is said to be an interested party in Pennsylvania, although how interested that party may be is unclear. Anyone with an interest should contact FRTM asap.

A bit further up the road in Wisconsin, the scrapping continues at East Troy as well as they redefine their collection and mission. CTA cars 28 & 35 are in process of being scrapped. Both IRM and FRTM were able to get some parts, and at least one pcc style truck is going to Kenosha.

I have to congratulate ETTM for thinning the duplicars from its collection, After all, do 38 CTA "spamcans" need to be preserved, including 11 of the 1-50 series single cars.

There was mention in an earlier post of an ex-Dallas PCC coming from National Capitol to McKinney Ave., i.e. coming home to Dallas. I checked the PNAERC list and couldn't find any Dallas PCC's under Nat'l Capital. I heard some years ago that one of the Dallas cars returned to Texas in the 1980's but was later scrapped because of terminal decrepitude. Can someone "fill in the blanks" on these stories?

I don't know that I would classify East Troy's current activities as simply "culling the herd of duplicates". East Troy's activities with their collection this year could more accurately be described as house-cleaning to align with what is apparently a new mission statement.

Besides the two ex-CTA rapid transit cars, the ex-P&W Stafford car is also gone, as well as one other CTA 1-50 series car which went to Fox River. All 4 of these were good service cars, in particular the CTA cars which provided heated transport for end of season trains. It's important to remember that use of cars like these that could be considered disposable on some level, also help with the service needs burden so that some of the more historic cars are not run down from too much use. Additionally, ET also scrapped a wooden interurban carbody earlier this summer as well, and there are a couple other units said to be on the chopping block as well.

And as a side note to the idea of too many of a given species being preserved,, by the same measure, should we then expect to see them dismantle their two CTA 4000 series cars as well ?

This is neither to condemn or recommend their activities. East Troy, especially in the last several years, has moved away from identifying themselves too strongly as a museum, and more as an electric tourist railroad.

To each their own I suppose, but I'm sure there are more than a few folks out there that had put a lot of work and effort into some of these pieces of equipment, only to see their preservation and restoration work all for naught.

Bob:
Follow the moving trolleys. The Dallas PCC going to McKinney Ave. is the car from the Lakeshore collection that NCTM had to buy to get the cars they wanted. There appeared to be some amount of arm twisting needed to have all of the cars included in the consortium bid. I have heard that eight cars were left on the table in the individual bids, so that the Brookins family effectivly had to accept the consortium bid.

John:
I hate to say this, but I have heard this before. We have to keep car xxx because old Joe (who hasen't been seen at the museum in 10 years) put a lot of work into it. Meanwhile, the car is occupying valuable carbarn space, does not fit our current collection policy, and has not been used in years.
BTW, I agree with you about East Troy becoming more of a tourist railroad.
Now, what is Fox River going to do with 5 spamcans? I doubt that they can keep more than 1 or 2 running. Our experience is a PCC car has to be operated somewhat regularly or it won't run. Maybe, that is why East Troy got rid of the 3 that we are discussing.

Where did the P&W Strafford car go to? Or should I ask...

Perhaps it would be nice if East Troy listed the cars that they want to dispose of as other museums have done. Granted that this isn't the best time to put trolley cars up for sale, but it seems like a better alternative than to just cut them up. Just my two cents worth.

Charlie

The folks in Iowa were well advised to avoid sinking good money into the body of box motor 100. It arrived at Pennsylvania Trolley Museum Monday afternoon 11/30 and I can assure them it would have been unlikely to have survived much more travel by highway. The entire body was wobbling in various directions as the truck brought it to the unloading spot at PTM. It is absolutely a basket case. PTM will pluck it of usable parts and dispose of the remains locally. We have plans for most of the parts, but the standard gauge Brill trucks, less motors, are up for trade or sale should some other museum have a need for them.