Can anyone recommend a starting point for a firm to complete a Master Plan for our railway museum in Campo? We have recently greatly expanded our property and are interested in developing a Master Plan for it's development as a railroad museum.

All leads or thoughts welcomed.

Thanks.

Jim Lundquist
Director of Museum Services
Pacific Southwest Railway Museum

I recently visited the Northwest Ry Museum in Snoqualmie. They have been executing a plan to build many facilities in support of a professional museum experience. They did not start with a blank slate and started drawing buildings and cool scenes, like many museums, but rather considered their mission statement, their collection, the message they wanted to convey, and how they wanted to convey it. The plan is not just about the physical plant, but about the whole museum, its collection, its volunteers, and its audience.

Who helped them... I dunno, but they seem to be on a good path, after many years of losing the battle with mother nature and limited volunteer resources. The physical plant is following suit.

Designing a piece of ground to hold storage buildings, tracks and machine shops is not that difficult, many decent civil engineers, landscape architects, urban planners or architects can do that. What is your budget?

The Wiscasset Waterville & Farmington group drafted an excellent master plan for their Museum in 2005. I have no idea if it has been updated since or how they track completion of the phases of the plan. Also don't know whether they had outside help with it.

I believe someone from that group occasions this forum and perhaps can elaborate on their plan.

I have to think back to how IRM developed, starting with a small core of fans preserving equipment to how its working and managed today, it looks like the (Pacific Southwest Railway Museum) have an operating ride already. So now you have new property to work with, new track space or right of way or an area/space to build on?

IRM still has equipment outdoors and it still has barn building its priorities to get equipment out of the weather.

IRM sets a plan for a project and gets a cost and puts a drive out for donations on that project, a budget doesn't mean much, a financial goal does. Once money is met the project can persue. (barn building, equipment restoration, etc), each project has its own "bank account" you might say.

PSRM might not function like that but the goals are the same.

You might need work areas, you might need display areas, maybe you want to build a roundhouse, or look at ways to attract more visitors, you should brain storm with some of your colleagues on what to do, the desires etc and what the museum needs.

Direct link to the 2012 plan: http://www.wwfry.org/projects/LongRangePlan2012.pdf

Direct link to the 2005 plan: http://www.wwfry.org/projects/longrangeplan.pdf

If the above links don't work, go to wwfry.org -> About the Museum -> Major Projects and scroll down the page.

We worked with a local architect to develop a plan. You may want to ask for referrals at the local parks department or planning office. We also used Stone Consulting to do a valuation based on the local architect 's plan.

Wesley
Check for a PM

You build the site improvement plan based on the vision for the facilities you need to provide the programming you design to carry out your mission in service to the public.

If you don't have the bigger conceptual stuff worked out, you have no basis on which to make any more granular technical decisions.

Best wishes with this very important work....and I hope you find excellent advisors. I'd recommend you go outside the confines of railroad preservation and work with people who come from a marketing and design background. You can always hire guys who draw plans and pour concrete to carry out any design, but having a good design.....well, let's just say that many of them I have seen are based in the realm of cheap and fast or convenience for the builders rather than impact to visitors as a priority.

dave

Trains
Visistors Center (with good restrooms)
Shop
Mainline to run on
Carbarns

This may be stuff you've already thought of, but...
--Where is the "front door"? What do you want passers-by to see that will attract them to your property?
--What is already on the property that you can use? Some like to bulldoze everything flat and start over, but if you want a picnic grove in a year or two, it's best not to chop down your old oaks. Do any structures have historical value? Can anything that is already there be used for your group's purposes? There's very little sense in tearing down one industrial-style metal building to replace it with another unless there's a really compelling reason.
--Where are utility lines, any currently unused road or rail rights of way and, perhaps most importantly these days, flood plains? If you want to use part of the property that is too low, what will you need to do to make it usable?
--Are there wetlands? If so, how and where are you going to make up for any you damage?
--What are the social factors that will enter into your design? Is there a half-built housing development that might give you trouble, or a vacant field that might become one? On the other hand, is there a busy intersection nearby where a good piece of landscaping and a billboard might get attention from motorists stuck at a light?
--Is there anything else on your property or nearby that might inspire a partnership with another group or company? What would add perceived value to a visit?

Like I said, it might all be obvious, but that's my two cents' worth.

Jim,

I sent you a PM.

Regards,

Paul

With regards to the question about the WW&F Railway Museum long range plans, I can answer "insider" questions.

Nobody prompted us to do it, and we did not get outside help. A few of us (myself included) had been doing it informally for several years until the Board asked for it to be done in 2003 (I think). While the first one took about 6 months to do the basics had already been done thanks to the informal group. Within a year of completion the Town asked us for a 5 year plan (for planning board purposes) which was easy to provide, thanks to the plan! It took another year or so for the plan to be reviewed and approved by the board.

We did send a questionairre out to the members, and got a number of responses. The number one complaints were lack of parking and lack of restrooms. It took us a while but we've finally addressed those needs.

The 2012 plan took longer to do, strangely enough. This time around we wanted to incorporate a "business plan" of sorts which would take an estimate of our income and expenses if we expanded the railroad to a certain length. Took a while to do, and our efforts weren't continuous but more off and on.

James Patten
WW&F board member

Thank you for your feedback. It's all helpful and items which have been considered.

I have one specific lead so far - are there others?

Jim

Thank you for your feedback. It's all helpful and items which have been considered.

I have one specific lead so far - are there others?

Jim

Thank you for your feedback. It's all helpful and items which have been considered.

I have one specific lead so far - are there others?

Jim

Three suggestions:

If you don't alredy have a detailed base plan of your current and additional site with existing buildings, track, roads, & utilities, hire a sureying & engineering firm to make one. It should include elevation contour lines and any underground utilities. Be sure to get both paper and electronic versions.

Develop detailed requirements for your needs for the site. Only your organization can do this, no outsider knows what or how much you need, whether it be more enclosed space for the rolling stock collection, additional visitor facilities, or anything else.

If you don,t have a person in your group with some CAD skill, the basics are not hard to learn. Then, using this skill and the base plan, experiment with site plans until you get one you like.

Now, you may want to hire an outside firm if you feel you need one.