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KB2VXA > TRAINS 27.02.11 17:04l 73 Lines 3542 Bytes #999 (0) @ WW
BID : 65016_VK6ZRT
Read: GUEST
Subj: Re: VE3WBZ > Locos off PPB
Path: DB0FHN<DB0MRW<DB0ERF<DB0FBB<DB0IUZ<DB0GOS<ON0AR<HS1LMV<CX2SA<N9PMO<
VE3UIL<VK6ZRT
Sent: 110227/1500Z @:VK6ZRT.#BUN.#WA.AUS.OC #:65016 [Boyanup] $:65016_VK6ZRT
From: KB2VXA@VK6ZRT.#BUN.#WA.AUS.OC
To : TRAINS@WW
Hi Pete and all,
Thanks for the URL but most having been absorbed I won't be needing it.
All I really wanted to know was the builder, so darn obscure frankly I
never heard of it. Stands to reason though having been in business only
seven years it was one of many "fly by night" foundaries that came and
went with the wind.
It just could be they were licensed by an English firm being American
technology hadn't yet branched far enough on its own to avoid legal
issues just like Garratt was produced under license from a Belgian firm.
You have it pretty much pegged, meters, valves and other brass piping are
missing because they were never installed. Remember they were shipped by
a steel foundry on their way to Baltimore when they were lost, could be
the wooden cabs weren't installed yet either rather than having rotted
away. Seems to me they're raw blanks that were on their way to a
finishing works when they went overboard, steel "pallets" and all since
the various articles make no mention of cables, clamps or other hold
downs normally used to ship large items up on deck.
Since you mentioned it, railroads have an interesting way of crossing
bogs and large bodies of water, just build the RoW right over it. Unless
there are hydrological complications it's a whole lot cheaper than a long
trestle now isn't it? BTW it's all right here on the Jersey Coast along
the NY&LB RR where the tracks run through everything but uncle Joe's
cornflakes and somehow the Parkway Commission should have taken a cue
from the railroad when in 1950 they built the state's longest parking lot
over the swamp at Morgan Creek. The RR trestle served well for many years
but they just HAD to build the roadway over quicksand! After more than 30
years of headaches fixing a highway that more resembled a washboard it
finally settled in, can't say how many tons of sand and stone they dumped
there trying to keep cars from sinking in the swamp.
Then you mentioned abandonment, the whole CNJ from South Amboy to
Atlantic City now lies abandoned and what hasn't been built over has been
reclaimed by nature. Maybe you can still see a few bits here and there
using Google Earth if you look just to the west of Rte. 9 down this way.
There are other lines here and there back in the woods and along some
there are "scrap yards" where locomotives and whole trains were
abandoned. Well, where there's old there is new so the rail system is
alive and well and in many cases better than ever. I had to laugh at
Obama though when he promised us a high speed national passenger system
rather like the ICE and Shinkansen when the Amtrak Acela never reached
full potential and never will. You've heard of pipe dreams, somebody tell
me what he's smoking, I want to get my hands on some of THAT stuff!
,
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My name is Chessie and I sleep like a kitten on the C&O, the most restful
ride in the country.
73 de Warren
Station powered by JCP&L atomic energy, operator powered by natural gas.
Message timed by NIST: 09:44 on 2011-Feb-27 GMT
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