This popped up on my feed today, G&W has donated one of the former Monongahela Super 7's to the Age of Steam for preservation. Locomotive 4092 was on the EPA list of locomotives in the "Mitigation Project". I'm curious, is the 4092 still a running locomotive? Or did the G&W have to do something drastic like cut a hole in the side of the engine block, or equivalent?

https://www.facebook.com/share/p/euVZXq94ZQuSccMc/

Has all the features of being top-heavy on bureaucrats and employees and having to generate activity to keep their budget from getting cut .

This kind of thing is rampant in every phase of industrial America.

A comment under the FB post says:

I would bet that the EPA would like to see G&W invest in some new power. Other regionals, such as Iowa Interstate, already have, and G&W is much bigger. The 50 year old 40-series EMDs G&W is relying upon are such fuel hogs that as I recall BNSF limited theirs to 60 mph in the years before they sold them off.

The Super 7s were made from traded in Western Pacific U23Bs, themselves made with traded-in EMD Blomberg trucks, I believe.

My understanding was that Jerry Jacobson liked them (as well as the ALCos he had) because they had better fuel economy than EMDs, down to how much fuel they consumed when idling. In his early years of owning an interest in Ohi-Rail, he commented on how much fuel we were going to use on the first "fan trip" he ran with his ex-Newburgh and South Shore S-2 and a "rider" box car with a ladder across the open door to keep people from falling out. I think that was 1983 or '84.

#1501 ended up going to BUGX (Dieselmotive Company, Inc.), still as #1501, and is now stored in Wellington, KS.

There have been multiple reports that #1854 is slated for donation to the Oregon Rail Heritage Foundation/Center, i.e., the home of SP #4449, SP&S #700, etc. ORHF/C already has a few historic diesels in their collection, in addition to the steamers.

If these reports are accurate, said donation has not yet occurred, as a search yields no results of an official announcement from said organization.

Like the #1501, both #1801 and #1852 were also acquired by BUGX. Like the #1501, the #1852 was reportedly slated to be moved to storage in Blackwell, OK, but as the #1501 instead ended up in Wellington, KS, the actual destination remains in question.

I've seen posts on social media from a few people who would definitely know and/or are heavily involved in ORHF confirming 1854 is bound for ORHC. As of Christmas Eve it was stashed at the Albany & Eastern shop in Lebanon. There's not much room for anything more at ORHC, but having a Southern Pacific SD-9 is kind of a no-brainer for them.

As of 12/30/24 the ATW 109 in Sanford NC is still very much alive and well. Was taken OOS for a short bit, but has since been brought back online.

Late to comment but, I wouldn't mind seeing #4092 painted back as #2302 in the original gray MGA scheme.

Over here on the B&P, there's an invasion of GE Dash-9 44CW's ex-BNSF, lightly patched, replacing the EMD GP35's, 40's, and 38's that have been around forever as road power. We still have a pair of 38's handling local yard duties. The ex GP35 slug unit (120) paired with 3120 is missing too.

The GE's are left idling as they don't appear to have block heaters, so it's hard to believe that whatever they gain in fuel economy isn't chugging away, maybe not.

None of the EPA blacklist equipment was B&P - I think because Butler kept better rebuild records than some of the other subsidiaries, that's my speculation.

But I'm going to miss five EMD's charging up the hill with a 70-car train, you could hear it for miles. Two of the GE's appear to be handling it now. B&P hasn't seen a GE since, well.... maybe Conrail around here and similarly rare on six-axle units with all the curves.

Demand 88 locomotives be destroyed while 9,200 planes, most of which are commercial airliners or military aircraft belch their tens of thousands of pounds of combusted jet fuel into the lower part of the stratosphere.

Comment of the day, stolen from another topic on another part of the interwebs.

"What would happen if you were abducted by aliens?"

"I'd thank them for conducting the rescue mission".

https://globe.adsbexchange.com/?lat=39. ... 7&zoom=6.8

Anyone who has followed the California experience with automobiles, realizes that when equipment reaches "museum status", the emissions mitigation goal HAS been accomplished, the work is complete, and there is nothing more to do. Smog isn't caused by a scant few "museum piece" Red Barchettas that come out for 2 Sundays a month in the summer. It's caused by the Pathfinder, Escalade, Odyssey or Tundra that's driven every single day by everybody. That's why they don't care about the Big Boy or the Jeremiah O'Brien. If UP replaced all their diesels with steamers that would be a different conversation.

Britain sees narrowboats the same way, nobody wants to take away their putt-putt engines.

Yes, but... that's not the issue.

The EPA had specific punitive intent here; "scrapping" the 88 locomotives isn't really about decreasing air pollution by disabling them forever. I would be at least concerned that would result in any charitable donation being "permanently disabled' -- I think this has come up before in donations of locomotives replaced by California EPA grants, hasn't it?

Based on my knowledge of Federal-level enforcement personnel, they would look at any 'donation' of one of the 88 locomotives as being an end-run around mandatory scrapping, and insist on at least engine removal or permanent disabling via their favorite little method -- I'd consider random holes drilled through a cast thin-wall block to be less damaging than running the engine with abrasive in the lubricant to ruin all the bearings and clearances.

I suppose it remains to be seen -- and for the record, I agree that it should be conveyed in 'runnable condition' for historic preservation alone, whether or not the acquiring entity intended to run it under its own power at some point.