How did those articulated Budd passenger cars ride at speed, say, compared to an Amfleet coach?
I was thinking about going to form impressions for myself, but sometimes thinking doesn't lead to doing.
They were somewhat more lightweight than the later AAR standard for "lightweight" passengers, which were standard until the Amfleet era.
If GM "killed the electric car", what am I doing standing next to an EV-1, a half a block from the WSOR tracks?
One thing (of many) that impressed me about IRM was when they ran their Nebraska Zepher train using it's EMD E-5 on a special pair of round trips between Chicago Union Station and Quincy IL at track speed (79mph) and served food cooked on board in the dining car to the passengers. They had to meet BNSF and Amtrak and FRA standards. That is a hurdle that few museums could pass in my estimation. They are still acquiring equipment and when they do, it has to have a fund for a storage space to keep it protected.
Here we see the difference between a museum and an activity center (train/trolley ride). Museums don't make enough money from their visitors and need to provide an activity to boost their income. All of the above venues with train/trolley rides should be classified as an activity. Typically the activity takes in more than half of the organization's income and spends about the same fraction. But that does boost the income so the doors of the 'museum' part can stay open. We are fortunate that we can provide rides to bring in the money. Many museums, need special events, significant donors and government support to stay open. I find it amazing that there are any non-government supported museum/activity running in the train world. And as for artifacts, train/trolley museums have nearly the same problem as flight musuems: the stuff is large. It is impossible to get roofs over all the stuff so much of it looks like bone yards... Roofs are nice over everything, but there is another significant expense that railroads musuems have. A model train museum would make much more sense.
New Englander If you're interested in narrow gauge, I recommend the Wiscasset, Waterville & Farmington Railway Museum (wwfry.org) in Alna, Maine. The 30-year-old museum has restored an 1891 two-foot gauge steam locomotive to service along with several rail cars and has reopened 2.6 miles of the original WW&F route, with restoration of a 3/4-mile extension underway that will open in 2021.
If you're interested in narrow gauge, I recommend the Wiscasset, Waterville & Farmington Railway Museum (wwfry.org) in Alna, Maine. The 30-year-old museum has restored an 1891 two-foot gauge steam locomotive to service along with several rail cars and has reopened 2.6 miles of the original WW&F route, with restoration of a 3/4-mile extension underway that will open in 2021.
Just getting a roof over most things will extend its life almost indefinitely.
Thanks for pointing out NMOT, Overmod. My hometown museum and has a fine collection, including one of my favorites Frisco #1522 and we do have a Big Boy too. Wish #1522 was still running. I'd add IRM, NCTM, Cheyenne Depot museum, CO museum in Golden, O. Winston Link and VMT.
Rick Laubscher, CEO of San Francisco's Market Street Railway Association, coined the term "Museums in Motion" for the 50-year-or-more-old historic cars, some running regularly, some on special occasions including one over 120-years old, on San Francisco's E and F streetcar lines, providing regular transit service, and of course the cable cars. This term certainly applies also to much of the Cumbres and Toltec, Nevada Northern, Strassburg, Grand Canyon Railway, and others.
It's a dilemma for RR museums. Everything cannot fit indoors, and everything that gets acquired cannot be refurbished in a timely manner.
It's inevitable that lots of equipment will be outside rusting away. Steamtown has LOTS.
I suppose some museums need to be more realistic about what they will ever actually get to, and just sell some equipment off for the scrap value. But how many railroad lovers would ever want to do that?
Me, I get a kick out of seeing the derilect stuff too.
Gramp https://nationalrrmuseum.org/ National Railroad Museum in Green Bay, WI. Another really fine museum. Almost a stone’s throw from Lambeau Field. (Maybe a little more).
https://nationalrrmuseum.org/
National Railroad Museum in Green Bay, WI. Another really fine museum. Almost a stone’s throw from Lambeau Field. (Maybe a little more).
NRM is a dud. Inauthentic re-lettering and painting are the beginning. See TripAdvisor on that one!
Flintlock76 You've done better than I have LO! From my own visits I'd say the top two on the East Coast are the B&O Museum in Baltimore and the Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania in Strasburg. I haven't been to Spencer Shops in North Carolina in 25+ years so I shouldn't comment on it at this time. I did enjoy it when I was there.
You've done better than I have LO! From my own visits I'd say the top two on the East Coast are the B&O Museum in Baltimore and the Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania in Strasburg. I haven't been to Spencer Shops in North Carolina in 25+ years so I shouldn't comment on it at this time. I did enjoy it when I was there.
Last time I went, the B&O and Strasburg museums had exhibits rusting and decayed outside. Even EA # 51 was in a dusty shed after decades on display indoors.
Overmod Why is NMOT in St. Louis absent from this list? IRM is world-class; if you had to have just one 'number one' by most definitions of the term, I think they would qualify. There's probably a parallel for trolley/traction museums: Branford, Seashore, Rockhill, and whatever that Electric City operation opposite Steamtown is are possibilities.
Why is NMOT in St. Louis absent from this list?
IRM is world-class; if you had to have just one 'number one' by most definitions of the term, I think they would qualify.
There's probably a parallel for trolley/traction museums: Branford, Seashore, Rockhill, and whatever that Electric City operation opposite Steamtown is are possibilities.
NMOT needs a lot of help. I went in August. Many exhibits are rusted and fading.
As for IRM, steam locomotives are displayed with main rods missing. Claim is that it eases movement. But, how often are they moved? It's like looking at the "Mona Lisa" with the face cut out with a switchblade.
Age of Steam and Warther's are both excellent - might as well round it out with the Dennison Depot Museum also in the area.
Thanks for all the tips, folks.
Pennsylvania trolley Museum in Washington, PA. Huge collection, lots of trackage, rides behind numerous car types. Friendly and knowledgable staff.
Boone and Scenic in Boone, IA. Really nice museum building; not cluttered. Rides behind steam, diesels and trolleys/interurban cars on city trackage. Plus the Kate Shelley bridge(s) just to the south.
Lake Shore Railway Museum in North East, PA. wish the building was open the day I was there. Lots of equipment and ability to watch NS and CSX mainlines.
Duluth was alright, ditto NYC museum in Elkhart, IN.
I'll also make a top 5 list for Canada, if life ever takes you north of the border:
Canadian Railway Museum/ExpoRail (Delson, QC, in suburban Montreal)
West Coast Railway Association (Squamish, BC)
Bytown Railway Society (Ottawa, ON, beside the Canada Science and Technology Museum)
Heritage Park (Calgary, AB)
Alberta Railway Museum (Edmonton, AB. Shameless plug for my own organization)
Greetings from Alberta
-an Articulate Malcontent
I think that the Illinois Railway Museum is truly in a class of its own. Operating steam, diesel and electric locomotives, a big collection of interurbans, streetcars and other transit equipment (including trolleybuses), and a rail line long enough to be worthy of running it all on. Not to mention all the indoor storage space they have built.
Others I would put in my top 10 (it is difficult to list them in a particular order)"
California State Railroad Museum
Virginia Museum of Transportation
National Museum of Transportation (St. Louis)
Nevada Northern
Age of Steam
Niles Canyon Railway
Monticello Railway Museum
Steamtown
B&O Railway Museum
The Illinois Rwy In Union, Ill. is certainly a top 10. I also enjoyed Mid Continant in N. Freedom Wisc, as well as the National Rwy Museum in Green Bay, Wisc. Also on my list would be the Western Pacific RR Museum in Portola, Ca. as well as the one in Duluth, Minn.
Tennesse Valley RR Museum in Chattanooga, TN home of 4501 and 630 running steam every day durring the summer season and longer excursions on the weekends in the fall.
[/quote]
Lithonia Operator Thanks for all the suggestions. Keep 'em coming!
Thanks for all the suggestions. Keep 'em coming!
My problem with NMOT (visited about 10 yrs ago) was everything was on top of each other. Not enough room to walk between the rows and the weeds and briers were not helpful at all. Yes they have some rare equipment.
oltmannd Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania in Strasburg and Seashore Trolley Museum in Kinnebunkport ME come to mind.
Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania in Strasburg and Seashore Trolley Museum in Kinnebunkport ME come to mind.
The California State Railway Museum is definitely first class. I haven't been to all of the ones you include on your list, so I won't try to rate them. Although you choose to confine your search to the USA, Exporail, just outside of Montreal and less than an hour's drive from the border with New York State, is one of the finest railway museums in the world. And no, you don't have to speak or understand French to go there; it is completely bilingual.
Just visited IRM two weeks ago and was amazed at the amount of equipment there. They have plenty of work to keep them busy for a looooong time in the restoration sheds. A good sign of a healthy organization is the facility additions that are being built now as well. If I had the time, I would become a volunteer and contribute to their cause. Maybe someday.
I don't think there's any real consensus on "re-branding" as you put it so well.
My attitude is the owners have the right to do with the equipment whatever they want to. If a rail museum in New England can't get a real Boston and Maine F7, but they aquire one from somewhere else and repaint it as a B&M locomotive, so what? It's their locomotive, they raised and spent the money to get it and pay for the upkeep. They have every right to repaint it, in my humble opinion.
Others may disagree. That's fine. They can hunt down and buy their own.
I tend to enjoy museums much more than the tourist roads, and I guess that's the main reason I specified museums initially.
But, also, (and as Overmod touches on above), many tourist roads are not really that "historical," in my opinion. And I'm not saying they should be, either. But it seems to me that their primary mission is to provide passenger rides on routes that historically once had passenger service; but they are not necessarly using equipment that has any real connection to that route. (For example, I doubt the Erie ever ran a BL-2 on what is now the Stourbridge Line.)
To me, lines like Strasburg or Nevada Northern are in a different league than lots of other roads. As Travis noted above.
There's a question I have about museums in general. Take the Railway Museum of Pennsyvania's beautiful Pennsy E7 #5901. When active, that engine actually was PRR #5901. But now let's assume an imaginary museum in, say, Maine, where I live. And let's say that museum acquires a Southern F7 and repaints it to "be" Boston and Maine. Doesn't that sort of thing happen a lot? And when it does, will most museums, right there on the display placard, note the actual lineage of the piece?
I don't know, but it seem like this "re-branding" happens more on tourist roads than at museums. Am I correct on this?
And what is the prevailing sentiment among preservationists regarding such re-branding? Do most consider this kosher? And if there is no prevailing sentiment, is this kind of a hot-button issue in the preservation community?
Please understand that I am not down on such repainting. Almost any way that folks preserve old railroad equipment works for me! My hat's off to the folks doing this hard, important work.
I guess the moral of the story is not every rail museum will run trains, but tourist railroads might have a museum attached, either large or small.
So, don't pass up either if you get the chance to visit.
The thing is that your original post involved major railroad museums. Most tourist operations, even when they provide good historical content, are far smaller and likely more constrained in their collection scope than the 'majors'.
On the other hand, they may be a firsthand source of information on particular niche interests that none of the large museum operations has.
A point that's brought up fairly often on RyPN, where it has specific technical interest, is that many tourist railroads that operate as businesses have a very different view toward 'historic fabric' in their cars and locomotives than a purely preservation-based (or historical & technical organization) might. So, for example, you might differentiate between a road that rebuilds its steam locomotives to be cheap and reliable to run from one that takes pains to maintain everything at a 'period' level ... or retires engines when some part of their historic construction threatens to give out, rather than put in a 'new' replacement for, say, a historic-fabric crownsheet and staybolting.
Our community is FREE to join. To participate you must either login or register for an account.