Murphy is correct, the Durham Western Heritage museum in Omaha is far more interesting than the UP Museum in adjoining Council Bluffs. Not only does Durham have several pieces of railroad equipment (such as UP 1243, a 4-6-0) but the museum is housed in the former Union Station building, which is a very nicely restored art deco structure.
Thanks to Chris / CopCarSS for my avatar.
Trolley, good for you for volunteering at Union.
I had the misfortune last year of visiting the Boone and Scenic Valley the day Thomas the Tank Engine happened to be in town. Unless you enjoy being in a horde of other people's preschoolers, I would suggest checking the museum's web site for special events before you schedule a visit.
The good thing about Thomas is that it does get a whole new generation excited about trains.
Boothbay Railroad Museum, Boothbay Harbor ME- 2ft narrow guage steamer (SR&RL)you can ride for a fee. It's small, but full of wonderful toys! Contains a recreated 1800's village and a lot of interesting nostalgia.
Norfolk Southern Railroad Museum, Norfolk VA- located at the NS headquarters building, free to the public. Has a really cool train simulator plus hands on displays. If you can get into the corporate building proper just look on the walls of any floor, lots of goodies to see there (O Winston Link goodies that is).
Transportation Museum, Ft Eustis, VA. Military transportation highlighted. Although not exclusively rail oriented, it does include many trains with some very nice Pullman's. Free to the public.
The Dixie D Short Line "Lux Lucet In Tenebris Nihil Igitur Mors Est Ad Nos 2001"
Hello All;
My wife and I had the distinct pleasure of riding the Grand Canyon RR last year. It was amazing!!! We scored the 2nd seat in the first dome car and saw how the late summer scenery changed from open prarie to mountain forest over a 60 mile journey from Williams AZ straight to the southern rim of the Grand Canyon. Our train was powered by an F-7, a GP-7, and an additional power unit of a type that I could not identify. The train cosisted of 2 dome cars, and about 13 coaches all lightweight fluted side budd types. It was a slow ride with allot of GOOD people to talk with---(My wife and I are rabid Eagles fans and we were chatting up a couple who loves the Cowboys for hours! How is that for a vacation atmosphere!!) If anyone reading this gets a chance to take that trip.....DO IT!! After all of that train riding and scenery, you get to see a true marvel of the world: The Grand Canyon. Enjoy!!
P.S. The PA memorial museum (Horseshoe curve) sounds awsome....I will have to plan a day trip this year. This is a very useful thread!!
Jim Davis Jr Pennsy, then, Pennsy now, Pennsy Forever!!!!!!!
In my opinion, The best railroad museum in Brazil is the EFOM site at Sao Joao Del Rey, MG. There we can see a good fleet of old 2 ft 6" gauge Baldwin collection. Also we can run a 15 km long train along Rio das Mortes, links Sao Joao to tiradentes. We have another great steam sites and railroad museums in Brazil, but EFOM is my favourite. Look hee why...
Just a few comments on the Illinois Railway Museum, where I have been a volunteer for decades. (Noting an earlier post that says or implies the collection has deteriorated.) We have over TWO MILES of equipment under cover! During the Thomas event we have NINE different trains in operation all day long, with the record setting day about 12,000 admissions. Not for the season, for the DAY! We have run freight trains of over TWENTY cars safely and maintained and inspected for photographers and guests. Over 15 freight cars are totally restored, and many of those under cover. This past year 4 diesel locomotives were totally restored, re-painted and lettered. In the past few years maybe a half dozen trolley cars were restored to operation, and full restoration continues. Come out on July 4th and you will see over THIRTY electric cars out, under their own power, passing in review with commentary and naration.
There are special events throughout the summer season and a full schedule can be found on our home page, along with many pics of the collection. Including over 500 views of just the freight cars. www.irm.org
Many have said you could do IRM in a day. Well, there are over 400 pieces of equipment on site and just walking past all of them would take me a VERY long day. Most have interpretive info documenting the car, design, history. Add to that operating rides up to 10 miles round trip, and as many as three different paths or routes.
The number of trains run and their schedule reflect the demand on any particular day, but typical summer weekends give you a choice of four different trains operating. Oh, by the way, your admission ticket includes UNLIMITED rides - a real bargain.
Yes, many cars remain outdoors, but every year significant progress and efforts continue. In the planning stages for possible construction this year is Barn 11, which will add another 2000 feet under roof.
Bob Kutella
My personal top five favorites are:
Lake shore in Duluth, MN
Feather River in Portola, CA
B&O in Baltimore, MD
California in Sacramento, CA
and Pennsylvania, in Strasburg, PA
I would like to go to the Illinois Museum, and the Railroad Museum of New England in Connecticut.
I really like a focused collection that is well maintained and interpreted. The museum in Portola probably has the worst facilities, but has a very focused collection and much of the equipment is operational.l I like museums with operational equipment like Portola and the Lake Shore.
Lastly, but I'm not sure they technically qualify as museums, but I really enjoy the Cumbres and Toltec and the East Broad Top. They are fantastic focused collections operating in their historic environment that includes facilities as well as trains. I suspect the Nevada Northern is also an excellent place and is on my list of places I want to visit.
Thanks to all for sharing this information! - Now I know where else to go.
Being from the West, I've spent most of my time at Western museums. But I have to agree, the East has some fabulous working museums. The museums I've been to (so far) are listed below in order of preference (working steam is a big plus for me):
Anybody ride/visit the Grand Canyon RR?
The Nevada State RR museum in Carson City is pretty good but no trackage. The Virginia and Truckee in Virginia City is alive and growing, once running all the way to Reno, the trains now head a few miles down the canyon but considerable funding has been raised to run it all the way to Carson City within the next few years.
However, the Nevada Northern is tops in my book. It is 100 years old and was turned over to the museum, which was created especially to take posession, by the mining company a number of years back, in running, operating condition. They run trains over two different runs, totally 30 miles of tracks. Their shops are staffed with paid and volunteer workers who will gladly show their talents to visitors. In fact, these guys actually train workers from other tourist railroad and museums on how to maintain their equipment. They are a real, living museum and are about to take back another 120 miles of track that runs all the way up to the UP, both sets, which used to be the WP and SP. Talk about possibilities for speeders and excursions!
Shabby? I don't think so, they are on a massive overhaul program.
I see there was mention of the GSMR in another post.
I would not classify the GSMR as a "museum". The Great Smokey Mountain RR is much more of a functioning RR; albeit mostly catering to tourists, campers, rafters and on New Year's Eve us old fogies that recall the wondrful days of the 50's wherein you could enjoy a formal 5 course 2+hour sit down dinner with linen followed by entertainment over a 4 hour ride. Having done this 2 years running, it is a wonderful experience--absolutely class act in vintage dining cars with great food.
You won't find this event listed on their website; you have to call them and make reservations.
Dana Gilmour, White Stone, VA
There are 3 prime RR museums that I've visited:
1. The Illinois RR Museum with a restored Zepyhlr and functioning traction.
2. The Calif RR Museum at Old Sacramento with wonderful restored equipment and numerous rides available and continues to expand with UP help.
3. The PA RR Museum across the road from the operating Strasburg RR and lots of good PA Dutch food available nearby.
Dana Gilmour, White Stone, VA.
Railfan1 wrote: THE NORTH CAROLINA TRASPORTATION MUSEUM.This museum holds the last (I think) ACL E-6 in full purple and silver. It also has SOU #6900 along with some other asst. things like a N&W GP9 in maroon livery. Plus, it's right next to NS's busy mainline. A great place to visit for sure.
THE NORTH CAROLINA TRASPORTATION MUSEUM.
This museum holds the last (I think) ACL E-6 in full purple and silver. It also has SOU #6900 along with some other asst. things like a N&W GP9 in maroon livery. Plus, it's right next to NS's busy mainline. A great place to visit for sure.
Was there in January, Spencer is a great place for train watching and the museum is very interesting...their roundhouse and turntable still function, as well!
You can do IRM, Mid Continent, NRM in one day each. If you are working North to South and don't want to ride the little loop at the National Railroad Museum, you could do that in the morning and then down to Wisconsin Dells for a ride at the Riverside and Great Northern 1/4 scale (15" gauge) line which I've found to be a lot of fun. http://www.randgn.com/ Do Mid-Continent the next morning (I recommend the S1 cab ride. I'm not an Alco guy but any cab ride is good.) and then down to Union that afternoon. (Don't forget to stop at the Cheese Chalet on I 94. http://www.ehlenbachscheese.com/) You should be able to get several rides at IRM and see all the barns in a day.
My List of best Railroad Museums
1. Illinois Railway Museum. Largest museum by number of pieces and decent ride. Wide variety of equipment and they are always looking for volunteers. I visit fairly often and for those who don't like how some things look, they should see how they come in. A big museum takes a lot of money and every Railroad museum could use more money.
2. B&O - This place is like Valhalla with the way the roundhouse is fixed up (I haven't been there since the roof collapse - Ragnarock). It is where pieces go to be immortal. No ride, however.
3. Strasburg/Pensylvania RR museum. I grouped them since they are across the street from one another. I was able to cover both pretty thoroughly in a single day.
4. Mid Continent (North Freedom, WI). My first train museum (1970) and my first steam locomotive. Small collection, no running live steam but good ride and you can buy cab rides. Last time I was there was 2005.
5. Colorado Railroad Museum. Home to my second favorite locomotive (CB&Q O5) and decent collection. I was there in 1998 and was not able to get a ride. Down the street from the Hakushika Sake brewery and you can visit them both in one day.
6. Tokyo Transportation Museum. http://www.kouhaku.or.jp/english/transe.html No train ride unless you count the Chuo line to Ocha no Mizu. Pretty cool but not a one day trip and not everything is translated. That said, you can operate a real truck from an electric locomotve including raising and lowering the pantagraph and you can operate a model maglev. Well, I had fun, anyways.
7. National Railroad Museum (Green Bay, WI). Interesting collection but not much of a ride available. Nice location by the river.
As a former board of directors member while living in Green Bay, I can attest to the volunteer aspect of the operation. Our Volunteer track crew made the necessary repairs to the track to allow the visit by the American Freedom Train. (Kinda date myself here :-)) While putting down the museum, you should look up the background of Harokd Fuller and Gordon Lendfesty (sp?) and how their contribution and determination made the museum possible.
I have visited once since we left GB and was very pleased with the progress.
BTW: your history teacher would be very "proud" of you. The Supreme Allied Commander of the AEF (and his personal train) is spelled EISENHOWER!! Dwight David Eisenhower.. Btw: he was also President of the USA!!
Former GB resident...
wgnrr wrote:Someone mentioned that NRM in Green Bay was a good railroad museum. Here's why I think it's the WORST...#1-Dumb train ride#2-Nothing that I can't see in anyother museum (i.e. Aerotrain, GG1, Big-Boy. Whoopie! (NOT!)#3-Many of the stuff they have acquired over the years has fallen apart so bad, it looks like it should be in a junk yard (They used to have a vinegar car, until they let it fall apart, Ely Thomas Shay #6, which came there in beautiful condition with a log car, has been taken apart, and put on display)#4-They had a operable Heisler for 1 year, until they decided they don't want to make repairs to it. Same thing with the Soo Line 2718. No one wanted to make any repairs to it.#5-C&O and UP engines should be near the C&O and UP. Not in Wisconsin where no one appreciates them. What's with the dumb foreign Eisenhauer engine? Put it somewhere else!#6-The shed they built (beautiful shed) was used to house the boring GG-1, Big Boy, and the EXTREMLY OVERATED Eisenhauer trainset, and not used for the equipment that is in the worst condition, that needs a covered, and controled building.If you can come up with why it's good, I'd love to hear. Maybe you can prove me wrong?Phil
Someone mentioned that NRM in Green Bay was a good railroad museum. Here's why I think it's the WORST...
#1-Dumb train ride
#2-Nothing that I can't see in anyother museum (i.e. Aerotrain, GG1, Big-Boy. Whoopie! (NOT!)
#3-Many of the stuff they have acquired over the years has fallen apart so bad, it looks like it should be in a junk yard (They used to have a vinegar car, until they let it fall apart, Ely Thomas Shay #6, which came there in beautiful condition with a log car, has been taken apart, and put on display)
#4-They had a operable Heisler for 1 year, until they decided they don't want to make repairs to it. Same thing with the Soo Line 2718. No one wanted to make any repairs to it.
#5-C&O and UP engines should be near the C&O and UP. Not in Wisconsin where no one appreciates them. What's with the dumb foreign Eisenhauer engine? Put it somewhere else!
#6-The shed they built (beautiful shed) was used to house the boring GG-1, Big Boy, and the EXTREMLY OVERATED Eisenhauer trainset, and not used for the equipment that is in the worst condition, that needs a covered, and controled building.
If you can come up with why it's good, I'd love to hear. Maybe you can prove me wrong?
Phil
I have a great deal of pride in this museum as a member of this community and a former volunteer at the NRM...
1. A BEAUTIFUL landscape on the side of the Fox River.
2. An incredibly restored "Big Boy" locomotive.
3. An original Zephyr passenger train in another shed that you can walk through and appreciate life in it as it once was.
4. A pleasant train ride that gives kids something to enjoy. This train ride crosses a creek twice over two bridges.
5. "Terror on the Fox" - one of the best Haunted Houses in the nation that also happens to incorporate a train ride.
6. "A Day Out With Thomas," "The Pumpkin Train," and "The Polar Bear Express" which truly involves the community and all of the kids who enjoy these annual traditions.
7. Beautiful static exhibits on railroad history inside of the museum.
8. An incredible gift shop.
9. One of the classiest model railroad layouts (operating) in the country.
10. Knowledgeable volunteers
11. A beautiful observation tower
12. Oh yeah, and all of this entirely through contributions, fundraising and volunteers.
I'd like to visit the California Railroad Museum in Sacramento, and the B&O museum.
But out of the ones I have seen, I choose the Tennessee Valley Railroad Museum, in Chattanooga, TN. Here's why. You can ride behind a steam locomotive (admittedly, only four miles), watch it get turned on a real turntable, and ride back. They have an active shop by the turntable that lets you see how real railroad people restore and rebuild all the equipment, not just the locomotives. Upon return to the parking lot, you get to see (and climb on) a nice variety of locomotives that are pretty good looking.
And right next to the starting station is the official home of the National Model Railroad Society.
Oh, did I mention that Norfolk Southern runs a main line right next door?
If you just want to ride a train, I strongly suggest two lines down here in the South. The first is the Great Smoky Mountains Railroad. I got to take a run on the line that included a river rafting package coming back down the Nantahala river. I had fun going up the river, and my very patient wife enjoyed the ride back down.
The other trip I would suggest would be the SAM Shortline, starting off in Cordele, Georgia and ending up at the ancestral home of Jimmy Carter, returning back to Cordele with stops in Plains and Americus. It is the only "mobile" state park in Georgia. While you are waiting on your train, you only need look over your shoulder to see CSX hard at work nearby.
I belong to the Southern Museum of Civil War and Locomotive History, in Kennesaw, Georgia. It's my personal favorite because as a member, I am allowed to research the archives of the Southern railroad there. When I get bored reading through the archives, I step back outside to catch a CSX frieght headed towards Atlanta or Chattanooga.
Erik
stebbycentral wrote:I can't speak to the museum at Green Bay, but both North Freedom and Union are 1 day trips.
So is Green Bay. While the IRM in Union has the biggest collection of the three it can be easily covered in a day. You might want to plan the trips around one of the museum's special days, when they operate more equipment than normal.
Bert
An "expensive model collector"
I have figured out what is wrong with my brain! On the left side nothing works right, and on the right side there is nothing left!
Since we seem to have jumped from BEST to WORST, I have to say that this last summer I took the family to a visit the Illinois Railway Museum in Union and I was seriously dissapointed. This was a return visit after a ten-year abscence, and things really seem to have gone down hill.
We were shuttled around the grounds of the Museum in a couple of beautifully restored trolly cars, but the Class I locomotives that used to be the core of their collection are sadly neglected. There were diesel units as "new" as a Santa Fe FP-45 that have holes rusting all the way through the sheet metal, and wooden freight cars with crops of green lichen plainly visible on the exterior. Except for the few examples that are stored under cover, their steam engines are literal rusting hulks. Stripped of side rods, valve gear, and most other operating appliances, and covered with a uniform brown crust. I am not sure if they have made a purposeful decision to become a museum that is primarily devoted to transit and traction. Or if they simply let their collection grow beyond the point where they could reasonably maintain it.
I contrast this with the day we spent at the Boone and Scenic Valley RR at Boone, IA. Their collection is a fraction of the size of the one at Union, but it's all kept in very presentable conditon, even the static displays.
I wish we had all that "boring" stuff here.
Mechanical Department "No no that's fine shove that 20 pound set all around the yard... those shoes aren't hell and a half to change..."
The Missabe Road: Safety First
coborn35 wrote: To each their own. And from experience, you put a roof over good exhibits, and not the ones that are deteriorating already to the point where some rain wouldnt really hurt.
To each their own.
And from experience, you put a roof over good exhibits, and not the ones that are deteriorating already to the point where some rain wouldnt really hurt.
In a perfect world everything would be undercover, however when money is tight you put what you have sunk money and time into.
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