Firelock76 Add this to the "fun fact" file: Commuters on the Lackawannas Boonton line used to call the open platform coaches "Wyatt Earps", since they resembled coaches used in Hollywood westerns!
Add this to the "fun fact" file: Commuters on the Lackawannas Boonton line used to call the open platform coaches "Wyatt Earps", since they resembled coaches used in Hollywood westerns!
I am told commuters on the Rock Island said this about the Harriman cars that were still in use in the 1970s. One guy even claimed to have found a bullet hole.
Dan
I live near their Palmetto, Fl maintenance facility and they have quite a few cars off their trucks on jack stands still wearing the colors of their previous owners such as the UP or Alaska RR.
The show I watched on the RBBX trains on Extreme Trains showed lots of detailed pictures of these cars. Some appeared to have celestory roofs but they all appeared to be steel and pretty long. I wonder what their heritage is and they continue to collect them for spare parts and new cars. They said they got them from all over but I'm curious where the bulk of them came from.
Well certainly Dave, I know they were steel coaches, and YOU know they were steel coaches, but you have to remember for the average "not a railfan" person perception is everthing, and to those commuters those Lackawanna coaches looked like something out of "High Noon" or "3:10 to Yuma." As a matter of fact I rode one of those coaches on the New Hope and Ivyland, and I'll tell you those commuters weren't too far wrong! Still, it must have been fun riding those things on a daily basis.
But they were steel cars, some with roller bearings! The D&H had some even more like traditional open-platform cars, possibly with platform railings gates. and chains taken from scrapped wooden cars, and they had both roller bearings and arch roofs instead of monitor roofs. (No, they were not air-conditioned! And neither were the Wayyat Erps.) I found them in Scranton-Carbondale (PA) local service in 1950.
The State of Mew York, under Gov. Rockefeller, bought surplus long distance coaches and parlor cars, and even a few sleepers, from several class-I railroads to replace old steam-hauled (nbow diesel-hauled) trains on the LIRR and the NYC and NYNH&H, many of which were just barely operable (rust holes in vestibule floors, etc.). These were reseated for commuter service, and then sold as operable cars when replaced by new equipment. Some undoubtadly ended up with Ringling, Others went to museums and tourist lines and some were scrapped.
From pictures in Trains, old steel open-platform DL&W Boonton-line coaches are popular with tourist operators, and so are DL&W Morris-Essex mu's used without motors or other self-propulsion equipment.
In 1971 Amtrak cut routes that may never show a profit. They had to review a surplus of Passenger Cars to see which were too far gone to rebuild or to up-grade for the new Amtrak.
A large number of "late model" passenger cars, by all builders, such as the New Haven's then 20 year old Pullman built Staineless Steel fleet, was insulated with ASBESTOS. Decontaminating and rebuilding would be too costly. Even the scrappers did't want them.
Don U. TCA 73-5735
aegrotatio Where did old coaches go? There seemed to be so many before Amfleets. Where does RBBX find its coaches?
Where did old coaches go? There seemed to be so many before Amfleets. Where does RBBX find its coaches?
With respect to the question of where old coaches go, you're probably shaving with a few of them.
This may be a better question in the Passenger forum.
But briefly, while there were indeed many passenger cars around at the formation of Amtrak (1971), a lot of them were in rather bad shape. Amtrak itself took the best of the rest (and upgraded them over the years), and quite a number of the worse were scrapped. However, a surprisingly large number hung on on forgotten sidings and in the backs of yards, usually decaying enough that the only thing to do would be scrap them.Others were taken up by museums, or various retail establishments - speaking of which, old passengers carsare being scrapped today (2011) at Boonton, the cars were purchased for some sort of linear mall which didn't pan out - here's a thread on a different board (several museums salvaged some parts prior to scrapping the rest). Others were purchased for 'private varnish', but these still needed to be upgraded to run on the National rail network (brake upgrades, safety devices, cabling).Eventually Amtrak started selling off it's 'Heritage' fleet as it purchased Amfleets/Horizons/Viewliners/Acelas and so on, although I think it still has some Heritage baggage cars (maybe diners - not sure about that anymore).So, most old passenger cars get scrapped, some get preserved as Private Varnish or in Museums, and some are parked on out of the way tracks, to occasionally get mentioned on railfan forums.
According to this wiki page on Circus trains, at least some of the RBB&B cars are refurbished pre-Amtrak 'Heritage Cars' - wonder if they will upgrade when in the future Amtrak begins to replace it's Amfleet and Horizon cars...
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