How much money has been spent to date?

How much more is needed?

Are the funds in place?

What work has had to have been redone?

I would simply like to comment about the shops at Steam Town. Having had the opportunity to look through the shop it would seem to me that THE SHOP INFRASTRUCTURE present is the best suited for a "ground up" rebuild in this country. I know nothing of the forces at ST and am not commenting on them, but there is every piece of machinery one could need in that shop. ...with the exception of a bridge crane large enough to lift a loco or a boiler from a loco(a large loco) but that is where outfits such as the company the 765 folks have delt with come into play for "one time" lifts.
Politics and all along those lines aside, were I to ever be in the position to do a "ground up" on a loco at ST I would jump at the chance. AT this point in time, in my opinion, there is no place better suited for heavy rebuild work.
On a similar note I have often thought that it would be a wonderful thing for ST to institute a program that would allow for a museum or tourist railroad the opportunity for a locomotive that is to undergo a major rebuild to be shipped to ST at ST expense in order for the selected contractor to use their facility to perform the rebuild. The logic behind this is that it would constitute a "temporary living exhibit" to be showcased for the visitors of the site. All musueums have budgits for exhibits....the fortunate ones are able to set aside the largest single portion of their budgets for exhibits and it would seem to me that spending say $40,000 a year on the shipment of a loco to the site would be a moneywise expenditure based on the long term interpretive value it would provide. All museums must have exhibits and a major portion of what steam town represents takes place in the heavy rebuild work of locos such as 1361....and after all, once ST is finished with there own locos and the 1361 what will there be to see aside from light maint. until years down the road?

As moderator I have removed this post.

This thread continues to push the limits of our use guidelines to quote:

"The Interchange requires all posters to adhere to a high standard of courtesy and civility. Polite, constructive criticism, and polite responses to same, are acceptable. Insulting or inflammatory language; argument and debate for their own sake; and personal attacks on other posters ("flaming") are all prohibited. Please note that this standard is inherently subjective, and is considerably more restrictive than the standards on many other railfan and railroad forums. Some people may not find it possible to express their full views and stay within this guideline. Other people may have legitimate philosophical objections to posting under inherently subjective moderation. In either case, we must respectfully ask them to express their views in other forums than this one."

Information on the locomotive, its restoration, funding, and future use is welcome, but some posts have become personal challenges.


Randy Hees
RYPN moderator

The article I referred Mr. Mitchell to is still there. The thread is called Operating the K4

Please, Mr Lewandoski is my Dad!

Perhaps the fact that the Museum has never "publicly discussed at any length" such plans is indeed part of the problem. I have followed the saga of 1361 closely from the time the loco was removed from the Curve (a move I supported wholeheartedly) through the initial restoration (well, it seemed like a good idea at the time, with a proposed Conrail steam program at one point) through the seemingly endless rounds of repairs and the lease-for-rebuild proposal. My opinion is based largely on the fact that there has never appeared to be a feasible long-term, long-range plan for the locomotive's operation and upkeep, if indeed any serious long-term plan--it's always looked as if "they'll figure out what to do with it once they get it running". Combine that with the fact that the marketing of both the museum and the locomotive ("Official Steam Locomotive of Pennsylvania") have basically cemented the loco into the museum and area's psyche, and I cannot possibly fathom, for example, a program similar to 261's rambles, or a year's lease to Steamtown or anyone else.

Part of this is also my coming from a different preservation background. I've spent over 20 years following and participating in the British rail preservation scene, where locomotives such as LNER 4472, the LMS Duchess of Hamilton, Deltics, Westerns, etc. maintain operations and identities separate from the excursion or main lines they work on. Trading locomotives between excursion lines and "nomadic" steamers drifting from line to line (sometimes by road!) for special events are now the norm over there, and as a result excursion lines can keenly avoid the "been there, done that" staticism that haunts so many operations in the U.S.



That is a strictly business decision between Steamtown and Altoona. Certainly, there's no motivation to let the NPS use 1361 for free, and the NPS is most likely never going to be in the position to make decisions that would be available were this, say, Strasburg, the Grand Canyon RR, etc. doing the work. In Britain, it would be almost unthinkable that 1361 wouldn't work a month or so of sold-out-well-in-advance trips to Moscow or Pocono Summit after all that time in town. But the "free market" is apparently not an option for either Altoona or Steamtown. (And some would again say that that is part of the whole problem!)



Nobody (well, not I, at least) is asking you to lose money. But those of us who know the current political, economic, insurance, and railroad climate in Altoona and the United States, as well as those who have seen the continual "hype" of "Altoona's Locomotive" over the decades are almost forced to laughingly dismiss any idea that 1361 will stray any further from home than, say, Bellefonte or Roaring Spring. (Okay, Williamsport I can also see.) I will be deliriously happy to eat massive servings of crow if, for example, the 1361 were to run on the NY&LB or the PRR Middle Division, or show up at a future Sacramento Railfair, or appear in Baltimore at some "Fair of the Iron Horse". But the current environment (surrounded by Norfolk Southern, insurance costs, hostile Class Ones, and the current uncertainties surrounding the current project and its timetable) forces me to be even more skeptical and cynical than average.

And remember--I qualify as a Slobbering Pennsy Foamer, I bleed Tuscan Red, and I have put my own money in both 1361 and the Museum. (Look up "John Axon" on the Memorial Wall.)

Please understand that I am not attacking Mr. Cessna or the Museum, or even Steamtown or other persons involved, personally. I fully understand that Mr. Cessna has inherited a situation largely beyond his control, that the current situation is attempting to make the best situation out of a combination of past misguided decisions and fate working in unfavorable ways, and it's far too late to "cut losses" and attempt to forego further restoration. I will applaud him for at least being willing to be in the hot seat amidst this turmoil. But the fact remains that I will also echo the queries of Brothers Rowland and Gears for the same reasons.

My point being that we get chastised when we do discuss the return and use of the locomotive and then the date comes and goes so we have not publicly had those discussions of use but have talked abut them at length privately. As far as a business plan, again, the public has not been privy to that document - YET. It does exist and has for years. We will be making the necessary revisons and making it very public when its ready.

The locomotive has never been marketed as the "Official State Steam Locomotive of Pennsylvania". Call it a matter of semantics but it is the CLASS (K4s) that has been designated as such. This includes the static display locomotive at the RRMPA.

I would be researching internet for good crow recipies. As you point out, much of this is beyond our direct control, but assuming the costs can be covered, thereby making it the smart business decision, 1361 will stray far beyond Bellefonte. I'm a bit puzzled however with your calls for the loco to go wandering but then seemingly dismiss your own ideas by saying the current climate will not allow it to happen.

As far as the funding questions that have been asked, the project is projected to cost about $1.6 million when completed. The funding is in place, although we continue to fundraise since any portion of the grant we don't spend on the locomotive is eligible to be spent on the roundhouse - it's all the same grant.

Regarding the "audit", there will not be anything released to the public. It wouldn't show you anything anyway. The required audit perfomed on the original grant is simply a test of whether or not we spent the grant money for the approved purpose - and we did - and the State accepted the report prepared by an outside CPA firm. Did we disagree with some expenditures made by the parties controlling the original grant, yes. Did the NPS make good on some of those items by providing us their own funds in return - yes. The audit on the current grant will not be completed until the grant funds are expended.

Regarding work that had to be reaccomplished or work that we were told did not need to be accomplished but we determined otherwise, I will offer you the written narrative I had to prepare for Penndot explaining the continued delay and increase in budget for the project. That text follows here:


Mr. Ed Stoltz January 13, 2005
Penndot District 9
1620 North Juniata Street
Hollidaysburg PA 16648

Mr. Stoltz,

What follows is a narrative concerning the changes in both timetable and cost for the completion of the restoration process related to former Pennsylvania Railroad K4s locomotive #1361. This restoration is being funded by Reimbursement Agreement Number 098418-C.

This agreement is the successor to a grant in the amount of $600,000 which funded the project for approximately 3 years. An agreement was crafted between the Railroaders Memorial Museum, the National Park Service (Steamtown National Historic Site), and the University of Scranton in 1996 and was amended over the course of time until a decision was made to hire our own crew in 2001. Those grant funds were finally exhausted in late 2002. Under this agreement, Steamtown was to hire, train and supervise a crew to perform the restoration as well as provide the shop space for the work to be completed. The University was to perform the administrative tasks for the project, issuing checks, etc, as well as creating a training program to recruit students and give practical shop experience to those students involved. No such training program ever materialized. The Museum was to have project oversight responsibility, approving payments, monitoring funds, preparing the necessary grant reporting, etc.

The crew labored under Park Service training and supervision on and off from 1996 through 2001 as funds allowed. Mr. Barry Claar was hired as the Museum’s project leader in 2002. Upon his inspection of the locomotive, it was ultimately decided that we should replace the Park Service crew with a crew working directly for the Museum. Mr. Bill Frederickson was hired to lead that crew. With the funds exhausted from the original grant and a new grant (current reimbursement agreement) about to be effective, Mr. Claar and Mr. Frederickson set out to create an estimate of the cost of completion and an associated timetable. This process resulted in the feeling that the locomotive could be finished in approximately 12-14 months at a cost of approximately $550,000. These estimates were made based on statements and data left behind by the original Park Service Crew and new observations made by Barry and Bill. It was soon apparent that the project was not as far along as the previous crew had stated.

As we reached the fall of 2004, it was apparent that we still had a year’s worth of work at a cost of still another $500,000 to finish the locomotive. This was the result of the crew spending a large part of 2003 and most of 2004 reaccomplishing previous work not done, in our opinion, to an acceptable standard, performing work that needed done despite the claims to the contrary of the Park Service crew, or performing tasks made necessary by those closer inspections. These procedures and their associated costs are subsequently detailed in this narrative.

One of the first additional costs not accounted for in our original completion schedule related to the locomotive’s steam dome. The steam dome is the highest point in the system and as a result is under a great deal of pressure. The original Park Service restoration included the installation of a welded patch in the boiler jacket in the area around the steam dome. When this repair was made subject to x-ray and ultrasound, it was found to be unsatisfactory. The weld included areas of “slagâ€

just for the record, there is no such thing as a "Consolidated".
the correct name for a 2-8-0 is a "Consolidation"
no locomotive type has ever been called "Consolidated"

the name Consolidation comes from the first 2-8-0 road locomotive built.
Baldwin, 1865, for the Lehigh Valley.
the locomotive was named "consolidation" in honor of the merger, or "consolidation" of two railroads, the Lehigh & Mahony and the Lehigh Valley.
(in reality it wasnt really a merger..the LV simply took over the L&M)
and because the first 2-8-0 was named "consolidation" because of the consolidation of the two railroads, all future 2-8-0's became the "consolidation" type.

http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/rea_home/lv04p.jpg

Scot

OK folks, we we patient and we tried, but despite our warnings and cautions this thread continues in a spirit of contentiousness, accusation, and counter-accusation that is contrary to the stadards we set for this forum.

Effective immediately, we are locking this thread, and we are imposing a 30-day moratorium on discussion of K4 1361.

I apologize to the even-tempered readers and posters who are inconvenienced by this action. However, for three days running this topic has generated multiple back-channel complaints to the management from various posters about various other posters. It is taking far too much time and energy from our families and our professional responsibilities to moderate. We are unwilling to invest our time in a futile effort to mediate among people who have no wish to actually communicate with one another.

People with sincere questions about the management of the K4 project are encouraged to post them directly to the management of the Railroaders' Memorial Museum. Mr. Cessna of the RMM has participated in these threads, and you can contact him or any other poster in these threads using the PM function to continue a conversation offline.

But for the purposes of the Interchange, this conversation is locked for 30 days.

Erik Ledbetter
RyPN Associate Editor
RyPN Board Member