Well, probably no one because outside of a couple of examples, our rail museums regard the environment within which they present their equipment with equal contempt.

The notable exceptions are museums that have preserved historic facilities such as Spencer Shops and Baltimore. Additionally, there are a small number of museums that made a big effort to build structures that were designed to preserve and present rail equipment to the visiting public. California State and RR Museum of Pennsylvania come to mind, along with the NPS additions at Steamtown. It may not be a coincidence that these museums get some of the highest rates of attendance in our movement.

As for this roundhouse, I'm glad it exists, but I do believe a nicer looking building could have been built using the same materials for about the same cost. Like a lot of RR museum "architecture," it is caricature.

We could do a lot better, but here and elsewhere it is easy to get the impression that most of us only care about restoring and preserving trains (and mostly locomotives at that) at the expense of a lot of the other things we need to do to make our movement popular and economically sustainable.

We get a lot of visitors at RMEO because of our ex Canadian Northern Railway station, which happens to be a national historic site.

http://public.fotki.com/elliottd/sfrmeo/sfrmeoalbum4/sfrma_smiths_falls.html

But your point is well taken, few railway museums have buildings of great significance, but their collections draw visitors.

Steve Hunter

The buildings don't need to have great significance, but they do need to be better designed for presenting the collection to the public. Appropriate architecture has the power to create a compelling context for our collections but most of our museums fail at this.

A restored train may look great out in a field or in the vignette created by sitting next to a preserved depot, but we have learned that we need to place and present the equipment indoors if its going to survive.

Mitch wonderful photos but did you get any of the kit form 1361?

I have this - I thought it was the tender for PRR #1361 at first, but apparently not.
Anyone know who's tender this is?

Most parts, such as the cab and drivers, so I'm told, sit inside a building nearby on museum property. The boiler is at EBT in Orbisonia.

/Mitch


Also attached - one more from Altoona featuring the turntable.

We all thought her parts were to go inside the roundhouse...I thought I remember the tender being by itself but must not if you couldn't find it. Hmmmm could mean progress but it could also be nothing.

I read somewhere that the tender is going out to a local contract shop for blast, prime and paint. May be off the property.

Thanks Dave! Knew it needed paint.....not surprised they wouldn't do it themselves....

Having been to the Altoona museum in September 2011 I thought I should chime in here for a moment. At the time, the new round house construction was well under way and the place was a muddy mess. The 1361’s tender was in bare metal and was obviously being worked on. As I look at these recent pictures, all I see is great progress. The section of the round house that has been finished looks great and the paint job on the tender looks outstanding as well. I was able to tour the building where the 1361 chassis and parts are stored and was impressed with the shop area. Its tight, but its all there with the exception of course of the boiler which at the time was at EBT.

I took the full tour of the visitor center and felt it was first class. The place was fairly busy as well, obviously another good sign.

I checked their facebook page last night to see if that is a better source of information on the museum than their web page. As is becoming more and more common, the FB page is yards ahead of the web site. This is common, even in business. Social media is slowly doing away with the classic web site.

I noticed on their FB page that they did give warning that the fee to visit the curve would be $20. Having run another museum, we did the same thing on special events. What museum, or any business, doesn’t charge a premium for a premium service?

I also noticed on their FB page that any gripes are from people who have never been there. Before casting a negative stone, it should be a rule that you visit the site first.

And while you are at Altoona, just a short distance away is the Flight 93 memorial. That is another must see. I had planned to stop there, but being the Tenth anniversary, I was preempted by a couple of presidents and such. On my next trip west, I will stop there for sure. And I will once again stop at Altoona. Its worth a stop.

And while I have FB on my mind, various NRHS chapters provide great updates and other information on their activities. If you are only searching for web sites, then you are far behind the times. No, I am not a kid. I’m a grand father who signed up on FB to see what my kids were up to and from there I discovered this other world of useful information which was work related, weather related, museum related. I have to thank FB for providing news as we sat in the dark during toughest hours of Irene and then Sandy. Conventional media was useless. I knew things were going to be bad with Sandy when I read on a local FB news feed (JSHN) of a house running into a bridge not far from my house. And things went down hill from there.

So, get with the times. Get on FB and see what is really going on in the preservation world. Visit the museums of interest. Spend some money as well. They need it.

J.R.

The tender pictured above is definitely not 1361's tender. It came out of wreck train service and was said to have trailed an I-1 originally. The museum fixed it up to be an auxiliary tender for 1361, with the coal space to contain drums of oil and other supplies. 1361's tender is fitted with the distinctive curved frame Keisel trucks and the coal boards are curved at the top. The last time I was in Altoona, 1361's tender was over in the former museum building, along with the drivers, various other parts, and a locomotive simulator donated by NS.

It's an I1sa tender, not a K4s tender. I was out there last year and the Museum has come a long way since that time. I too, see progress. The 1361's tender was stored outdoors at that time, on adjacent property, half painted with primer, half black. It should be finished and moved indoors, but of course, I have no idea of when.

It looks to me like they're struggling to get to their feet. One generally offers a hand, not a kick in the gonads.

You're right. I just checked my pictures from 2011. The 1361 tender is quite different from the one shown above in this thread.
J.R.

Still confused so they won't be moving 1361's parts inside the new roundhouse?