Someone broke into the fleet of preserved New York City subway cars at Coney Island Shop and stole parts out of many of them - again. Cross-post from the Subtalk board at www.nycsubway.org:

The chances of the stored R-9's and R-16's running is getting less and less. Someone broke into several of the stored Railway Preservation cars and made off with a whole lot of stuff. Many R-9's had their brass air guages stolen. 1300 has many grab handles that were stolen. The R-16's have numerous items missing. Other things missing include rollsigns and whistles. To gain entry the storm door locks and handles were smashed open.
At this time, We are still trying to get a full list of missing items. Things are being done (AGAIN) to make sure this stops. I know that people collect stuff but these items belong on the cars and not in a rec room or basement. I am asking anybody who has the following items consider donating them for the museum cars that you know and love. It is up to us to replace the missing items so we can have these cars running in 2004 and beyond

-Air Guages (10-15)
-Whistles (5-10)
-Storm door locks IND or BMT type (10-15)
-R-1-9 rollsigns

I will post any more findings tomorrow.

-Mark W.

Any questions? You can email us at: MuseumCar@aol.com

F-Hicks@wiu.edu