I was going through some land records in Niagara County and was surprised that Penn Central still owns the land under the Amtrak Station out there under Niagara and Auburn RR holding company or something like that. Auburn & Syracuse I think it was as a matter of fact.
The mudchicken has frequently pointed out that county land records are often questionable when it comes to railroad holdings. It's quite possible that the county records were never updated after the establishment of Conrail in 1976.
Penn Central's real estate and railroad operations were separate. The real estate division was not part of the bankruptcy and was separately owned by the Penn central Holding Company, as was the railroad. The Penn Central Holding Company was not insolvent and survives to this day.
I could be mistaken, but, I have heard that PC still owns the lad on which Six Flags Kentucky Kingdom sits...
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I would opine that this is just another example of corporate looting - buy the whole company, then shed the parts that aren't paying as well as you'd like (or aren't paying at all). Apparently the real estate portion of PC is still profitable. Most of us know the story on the railroad side...
Larry Resident Microferroequinologist (at least at my house) Everyone goes home; Safety begins with you My Opinion. Standard Disclaimers Apply. No Expiration Date Come ride the rails with me! There's one thing about humility - the moment you think you've got it, you've lost it...
Bonaventure10 I was going through some land records in Niagara County and was surprised that Penn Central still owns the land under the Amtrak Station out there under Niagara and Auburn RR holding
I was going through some land records in Niagara County and was surprised that Penn Central still owns the land under the Amtrak Station out there under Niagara and Auburn RR holding
RR property? Could it be a title problem that has not been cleared? Is this property providing enough income to cover insurance and taxes ?
This is news? The Penn Central estate got all the cast-offs that did not go into Conrail, Amtrak or spun off into shortlines. Carl Lindner in Cincy owns them currently and has them headquartered in Cincy with the other family businesses (started with a dairy & milk stores in the 1930's) . The skeletons in their closet are every bit as ugly as the ones created by CR. Compound that with PC/CR/USRA's poor recordkeeping and the legacy mess is too big to sweep under the rug - a headache for all us mudchickens,Amtrak, CSX and NS.
I may be mistaken, but I think we had some similar conversations around the arena of the use of Railroad ROW's when they were being used to lay down any number of Fiber Optic Cable lines ( SPRINT ( of Southern Pacific Lineage, and then, The QUEST Corp., come to mind).
Mud Chicken, Diningcar and some others weighed in with some interesting facts referencing the kinds of deed held by the railroads, vs. the adjacent land owners and how those deeds in some cases dictated the specific uses and limitations on the railroads and how they could use those ROWs and what uses could and could not be made of them .
A link to that discussion is @ http://cs.trains.com/trn/f/111/p/215753/2370511.aspx#2370511
Because a railroad may cease to exist as a Corporate entity. It may have property, p[ossible, as an intellectual or maybe even physical in nature that will have on going value to others. The SPRINT system of former Southern Pacific ownership is a case in point.
Some of the discussions on the posted-linked Thread so how property as well can become under some circumstances, a legal football as well. So the Case for Penn Central still existing, in-part, as an entity owning Real Estate, could be a case in point.
tree68 I would opine that this is just another example of corporate looting - buy the whole company, then shed the parts that aren't paying as well as you'd like (or aren't paying at all). Apparently the real estate portion of PC is still profitable. Most of us know the story on the railroad side...
Huh? If you bought the whole package, would you want to hang on to the parts that were confirmed money-losers, especially when somebody offers to buy them from you? Should Ford have kept on building Edsels?
I believe that they owned Grand Central and some related property until the past five years or so.
samfp1943 Because a railroad may cease to exist as a Corporate entity. It may have property, p[ossible, as an intellectual or maybe even physical in nature that will have on going value to others. The SPRINT system of former Southern Pacific ownership is a case in point. Some of the discussions on the posted-linked Thread so how property as well can become under some circumstances, a legal football as well. So the Case for Penn Central still existing, in-part, as an entity owning Real Estate, could be a case in point.
Because the corporate entity is no longer a railroad, doesn't mean it doesn't exist. I've read that some of the other railroads that went into Conrail, after selling their railroad assets and being released from bankruptcy continued as corporate entities. They no longer were operating railroads and may have changed their names. Some still had real estate holdings that wasn't conveyed to Conrail, plus at the time there were tax credits from past years where they had lost money that they could use to offset any future earnings.
The Rock Island's corporate structure continued after the railroad quit operating. In 1984 it came out of bankruptcy as the Chicago Pacific Corporation. After paying off their creditors there was cash and assets (including the tax credits from the years of losses) and they became a holding company. Eventually being merged into Maytag, who wanted the home appliance companies C-P Corp had acquired.
Jeff
From Wikipedia-( In short Reading is a movie theater company)
On April 1, 1976, the Reading Company sold its current railroad interests to the newly formed Consolidated Railroad Corporation (Conrail), leaving it with 650 real estate assets, some coal properties, and 52 abandoned rights-of-way. As of 1999, most former Reading lines are now part of Norfolk Southern Railway (NS), as a result of the Conrail split between NS and CSX Transportation. It had sold 350 of the real estate tracts by the time it left bankruptcy in 1980.
In the late 1980s a Los Angeles lawyer named James Cotter gained control of the corporation through his holding company, the Craig Corporation, and liquidated the rest of its assets to finance his cinema chains in Puerto Rico, Australia and New Zealand. The company sold one of its last railroad-related asset, the Reading Terminal Headhouse, in 1991. In 1996, Cotter reorganized the company as Reading Entertainment. The Craig Corporation merged in 2001 with Citadel Holding Corporation, another Cotter company, and became Reading International, Inc. RDI still ownes 317 acres of former railroad property, mostly in upper Pennsylvania, along with the Reading Railroad publicity files of approximately 300-600 lin. feet (as of 2011).
Most of Reading Entertainment's operations are in Australia, New Zealand, and United States under the Reading Cinemas trade name. [17]Its logo is a railroad transforming into a film strip the logo depicts a railroad transforming into a filmstrip to tell the story of the history of the brand.
Los Angeles company-based Pacific Theatres decided to sell 15 of the 29 theaters operated by Pacific Theatres Exhibition Corp. and its affiliates, comprising 181 screens in Hawaii and throughout California, outside of Los Angeles, as Pacific wanted to become an exclusive entertainment company primarily in Los Angeles. Reading International had interest in purchasing these theatres in late 2007, finally coming to an agreement in finalizing the purchase February 22, 2008. These theaters reportedly generate around $80 million in revenue annually. Nine of the theaters, comprising 98 screens, are located in Hawaii and operate under the Consolidated Theatres brand name and represented nearly 70% of the Hawaiian box office receipts reported in 2007. Six theaters, comprising 83 screens, in San Diego, Bakersfield, and Rohnert Park California, operated as Pacific Theatres have been converted to the Reading Cinema brand name. Reading's purchase was financed principally by a combination of debt financing from GE Capital Corporation and seller financing. During 2009 and 2010, much of the seller financing was forgiven as part of contingent purchase price adjustment terms and tests in the original purchase agreement.
In October 2008, Reading Entertainment and Screenvision entered into a long-term contract to provide digital, satellite-based pre show to all Reading Cinemas locations in the United States. Replacing traditional slide show presentation, the digital preshow by Screenvision would cover advertisements from television shows such as: E! Entertainment, ABC Family. and MTV, upcoming films, and business advertisements such as: Verizon Wireless, Dodge, and National Guard, pending on the movie's MPAA rating. The digital preshow would also cover local businesses who purchase time on the pre show.[18] All Reading Cinemas locations in the United States officially began the digital preshow December 2008.
Reading Cinemas began installing digital projection in 4 of its theatres in the United States using DLP projection technology. These projectors are also capable of showing Digital 3-D presentations. Per Reading's 2009 10-K filing: By mid-year (2010), it anticipates Reading will have 3D projectors in not less than 28 out of the 53 cinema locations that it either wholly owns or consolidates.[19]
Abandoned RoW's like that could be the routes for dedicated passenger rail services from NYC to the west, including HSR, especially since they might well be available for little or no cost.
C&NW, CA&E, MILW, CGW and IC fan
schlimm Abandoned RoW's like that could be the routes for dedicated passenger rail services from NYC to the west, including HSR, especially since they might well be available for little or no cost.
If you don't have the foresight to acquire the line at abandonment, it's long gone and almost impossible to re-establish)
For example, the former CNJ R-o-W on the northern bank of the Lehigh River from Easton, PA to the west as far as the Rt. 33 overhead bridge is now owned variously - in 1 to 2 mile segments - by the Hugh Moore Parkway (City of Easton ?), Palmer Twp. & Bethlehem Twp. Bike Trail, Delaware & Lehigh Canal Commission (?), and the PA Fish & Boat Commission (actually going to the latter later this afternoon !). Tantalizingly, though, the next several miles (about 70 acres) from the Rt. 33 bridge to the west through Freemansburg are now unquestionably owned by Norfolk Southern, which has paid taxes on them ever since acquisition from ConRail circa 1999.
- Paul North.
Biked on the Lehigh Canal from downtown Bethelham to Easton....ROW was very visable 7 years ago from canal trail now is fast disapearing ....WE NEED THAT RIGHT OF WAY FOR COMMUTER RAIL AND WE NEED IT NOW!
Bonaventure10 Biked on the Lehigh Canal from downtown Bethelham to Easton....ROW was very visable 7 years ago from canal trail now is fast disapearing ....WE NEED THAT RIGHT OF WAY FOR COMMUTER RAIL AND WE NEED IT NOW!
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