Steam on NS

[NW Mailing List]

NW Mailing List wrote:

> I just hope it is just the beginning--a rebirth with the final goal to 

> rescue our girls from VMT.


I hope to see 611 in steam again in my lifetime, but I seriously doubt 
1218 will ever move under her own power again.  From conversations I've 
had with former members of the steam program, she was in bad shape to 
begin with.  She'll need a complete rebuild, possibly including a new 
boiler, before she's in decent operating shape.  Add to that the 
difficulties related to size (how much does UP spend making sure their 
facilities can handle the Challenger?), and it would take a miracle to 
put 1218 in steam again.

Honestly, we probably have a better chance of seeing one or both used in 
private service if Ross Rowland's latest dream comes true.  I won't be 
holding my breath.


> We have to accept that we may never know the real reason it stopped in 

> 1994.


It's no great mystery.  The risks (liability in case of derailment, 
boiler explosion, wreck, etc.) and costs (operating cost, maintenance, 
scheduling, manpower, insurance, delayed traffic) were too high to 
justify the return (happy railfans who don't spend anything on NS?).  I 
don't like it either, but it was a purely financial decision from a 
corporation (not a railroad) with no sense of its own history or 
interest in anything beyond the next quarterly profit.  The fact that 
they're thinking of allowing steam on NS again has more to do with a CEO 
who is also a railfan and model railroader than anything else, and will 
probably last only as long as he does, unless it can be designed in such 
a way that it becomes profitable to continue.  It may well be Moorman's 
downfall, if it turns into an expensive fiasco.
-- 
Kenneth Rickman - krickman1 at carolina.rr.com
Salisbury, NC