After suspending regular weekend excursion service to complete track upgrades, the Florida Gulf Coast Railroad Museum located in Parrish, FL (near Tampa and Sarasota) will reopen at 10am on Saturday, September 16, 2006 with a public event including a golden spike ceremony. Come out and ride the train and see the improvements.
Visit the museum's website at http://www.fgcrrm.org/
I took the 6 mile roundtrip ride on the museum's train. Consists of heavyweight and streamlined cars, including an ex-VIA lounge car. Locomotives on each end. One a GP-7 and the other an Alco RS 2 or 3.
The ride was about 5 mph and the cars rocked severely. It was literally hard to stand up The roadbed was in very poor shape. It was hard to believe that in the 1960s that stretch of track allowed passenger trains to blast by at 60+ mph. Still the ride is enjoyable, especially if you appreciate pre-Amtrak equipment.
I'll definetly check it out. I"m glad to read track upgrades have been performed. The volunteers are friendly and work hard to maintain the equipment but I wonder who performed the track and roadbed upgrades. CSX? Had to be pretty expensive as that roadbed had sunk down a bit.
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