If you fail to see the constructive nature of my posts about what is basically preservation management, well, that is really your loss. Based on our individual life experiences, we obviously have developed slightly different impressions of the verb "to complain". I'm good with that. Have a pleasant evening.

Therein lies the core of why government budgets are as high as they are. Everyone sees a massive budget and feels whatever they think is important should be funded by taxpayers. The problem is very few people can grasp the scope of how much stuff governments pay for.
And for each thing you all would feel would be waste of money, others would equally view that which you think should be funded (like Steamtown for example) is a criminal waste of their tax dollars. They also will argue that tax money should only go to that which will benefit the individual taxpayer alone. For example, my wife and I couldn't have children, so many people in the same position would (and often will) argue that their tax dollars shouldn't go to schools.
And don't forget the politicians arguing for as much money to spent in their little corners of the nation, whether it makes any sense or not.
Then, there are those who can't see the overall picture. Countless people demanded to end of the NASA Apollo program before launching the first Saturn rocket, in favor of giving that money to welfare programs. So, we could have had the greatest achievement in human history since the invention of fire, or we could have added another generation of welfare families to the budget.
I think the choice that was made, in the big picture, was a no-brainer but plenty of people still feel the wrong decision was made in that case and we should have given the money to welfare families instead of going to the Moon.
If you really wanted to cut government spending, places like Steamtown, if we can be honest with one another, would be the among the first to be cut.

“So, we could have had the greatest achievement in human history since the invention of fire, or we could have added another generation of welfare families to the budget.
I think the choice that was made, in the big picture, was a no-brainer but plenty of people still feel the wrong decision was made in that case and we should have given the money to welfare families instead of going to the Moon.”

Not to get too off topic but it’s all in how you word it. Those on the other side would say “you could waste a bunch of money so you can brag about going to the moon or you could actually feed and house your own citizens”

I’m not saying that’s how I would word it, but you can spin it either way.

I remember reading several online fights when TVRM sent the 349 to the children’s hospital. On one side you were not supporting the original intention of the museum. On the other side you were against hospitalized children.

You can wish that Steamtown would prioritize operating steam and realize that the 6 million budget they are getting isn’t wasted. The facility is kept very nice and the displays they have are extremely well done.

Ok, so we have 11 pages with a lot of complaining, ideas and wishes being tossed around. Very little actionable items, however.

So - what can WE do - both us ordinary folk and those in the industry - to get the situation to change for the better? I’m not talking about hypothetical actions. What can actually do - tonight, tomorrow, over the next weeks and months, etc - to change the situation at Steamtown for the better?

Please don’t say “go volunteer” there either. It’s apparently very clear that volunteers are much less welcome at Steamtown these days under the current Super. What ELSE?

An open, all weather shelter can be constructed for $150,000, and a deluxe model for perhaps twice that. One can be spread over existing tracks. Outdoor equipment is kept dry and can even be worked on in four seasons. Certainly within the Steamtown annual budget.
I also was under the impression that running Canadian equipment meant it could be worked on expediently, without worries regarding welding versus riveting and historic paint layers?

Is the problem with Steamtown lack of funding or inept management by people who know knowing about historical railroad equipment? Seems like the latter, although injecting a healthy transfusion of dollars could be a step towards remedying the problem. How those dollars are used, as in hiring shop people and letting them do what they're good at, seems, at least to me, like the immediate remedy for what ails the place.

On the other hand, the public is dumb about railroad restoration and eats what they're fed, so why change?

My dear friends. We all know the definition of insanity.........doing the same thing over and over and over with same result but unable to stop.

We've all witnessed the slow, steady dwindling of steam in Scranton to where it's now totally nonexistent.

This is federal gummit operation. It's shown you its true colors. It's NOT going to change.

Please take your passion for steam and devote it through one of the many up and running steam operators who do it right where your support will be welcome and where you can make a difference.

Just makes sense. Wasting any effort on Scranton does not.

Ross Rowland

It seems as though these guidelines need to be followed when it comes to new construction with the NPS: https://www.nps.gov/tps/standards/apply ... uction.htm

Richard Glueck - Yes it most certainly can be but keep in mind that it is an historic site so new building requires approvals (which are supposedly not an easy thing) because one is changing the historic site. During the search for Kip's successor, one of the search committee Park Service people had, as part of his regular gig, responsibilities in this area and I had a discussion about this exact idea with him. He said the restrictions for temporary structures were (this was what, eight years ago?) a bit easier than for a permanent structure but that it required that the structure be temporary and for a fixed period of time. There was also a discussion about renewing the time period but I must apologize that the details escape me. So not like just going to the town for a building permit.

Kip had a plan to refurbish the Mines and Stores building to hold the equipment both inside and outside on both sides of the building under a roof with one side against the building and the other side to the open. The remnants of the building did not have a roof on one side but Kip had found a drawing showing a shed roof on both sides so he believed he could get approval to build it the way it was drawn. I have his estimate for how much equipment he hoped to get under cover someplace. Anyway, the building collapsed from neglect before he could line up the funding.

Putting our heads together we are talking about:
CNR 47
CNR 3377
CPR 2929
Brooks-Scanlon Corporation No. 146
Lowville and Beaver River Railroad No. 1923
Maine Central Railroad No. 519
Meadow River Lumber Company No. 1
Nickel Plate Road (New York, Chicago and St. Louis) No.44
Norwood and St. Lawrence Railroad No. 210

Let's exclude 3377 for the time being as there had been rumblings of bringing it back into service to replace 3254 and use the never -used new stainless steel tender the Park Service built for 3254. That leaves two of eight Canadian locomotives that likely would be subject to less stringent requirements and six of eight which would likely require a full inventory. Keep in mind that the Park Service did some preliminary studies on some (?) of the locomotives very early on. I requested a paint study that was done on one of the locomotives and which was cited in a document created by the Office of the Park Historian. The Park Historian could not find it. The Curator was able to locate the abstract for me which provided only summary details. So some work that was done long ago may need to be replicated. The equipment has also suffered a lot of loss in the intervening years so the inventory of each artifact may need to be performed again using the original study (if it exists) as a guide.

As I said, the "Paint and Park" approach was suggested by the Park Historian in the early 2000's as a way to deal with the large amount of equipment outside with no shelter. It was a good idea then but with the amount of deterioration that has occurred since then, I do not think it is a viable option any longer. This equipment is at risk, as evidenced by the scrapping that occurred a few years back.

bigjim4life - to answer your question, in my opinion the first thing is to wait and see what the new Superintendent does. See if the agreement with the Lackawanna folks is renewed and what the arrangement is for the completion of the Boston and Maine. See if operation of 26 begins again in spring of 2022. The cessation of operations to me was unnecessary (see my discussion of running yard switching demonstrations in lieu of the yard shuttle) and risky given the demographic cliff they are facing with their shop and operations people that Superheater mentioned. The other thing I have been trying to do in this thread is raise awareness of the artifacts that I believe are a risk from both the elements and the lack of inventory control.

Unfortunately, as I said, I'm no bright light and so my ideas are limited. Based on my limited experience, other than trying to find a better home for the equipment we've been discussing I'm not optimistic that any change is possible. My main goal has been to make those who are not familiar with the collection aware of the items outside that have not had any care since they were in VT. Thank you both.

A mate of mine saw this and suggested this might be a good fit here:

More appropriate would be a quote from Rumi, a Turkish poet; "Fish begins to stink at the head, not the tail."

Time for a new fish.

Not to veer off topic, but if Steamtown moved to deaccesion a piece of equipment, would the monies generated from said sale go directly to STEA or into the general NPS (or higher) fund?

"Not to veer off topic, but if Steamtown moved to deaccesion a piece of equipment, would the monies generated from said sale go directly to STEA or into the general NPS (or higher) fund?"

You might be able to find this by accessing Title 54 of the United States Code.

Most of the laws that applied to the NPS were formerly under Title 16, but in 2014, the following was enacted as a housekeeping reorganization:

Public Law 113 - 287 - An act to enact title 54, United States Code, ``National Park Service and Related Programs'"

A cursory review did not reveal anything obvious; nor did a cursory review of the NPS Director's Orders.

Just a hunch, but I suspect that if something is deaccessioned, it becomes ordinary property and may fall under GSA or OMB government wide rules. In some cases, proceeds from sales are retained by specific government funds (in this case a "fund" is a term of art in government accounting) and others the proceeds are directed to the United States Treasury.

I do not wish to derail the " Steam (returning/being restored/being rebuilt) in 2021" thread so, at the risk of hurling RYPN further into the abyss of mediocrity, I have cut and pasted the following into this thread.

Thank you for following up on ex-STEA volunteer Superheater's post regarding 3713. A few observations/comments:

1. My recollection of the Director's Orders (DOs - the Park Service Regulations) is that agreements with partner organizations, such as the one governing the restoration of 3713, have to be reviewed regularly - a period of five years sticks in my head. I do not believe that this agreement was reviewed from the time of its inception to the time it was modified by then-Superintendent Debbie Conway - a period of around fifteen years or more. The agreement is up for review and, due to the previous failure to adhere to the review protocol, I have to conclude that this review has a very high visibility to the Regional Office in Philly. So it will be done in a manner that the current Superintendent makes sure she has cover and that all of the procedural issues are addressed. This is why I previously suggested that a wait and see approach is best. It all moves at the speed of government - big government.
2. According to the Park Service, they have expended about 1.5 year's worth of FTE on the project in 1.25 years so they have about 1.2 people working on the restoration over the last 15 months for a full return to operation restoration. This gives great insight as to the timeline involved.
3. Any interruption to this project and to rail operations as far as volunteer involvement is understandable. Based on my limited experience, Park Service regulations are written for the Park Service and not the volunteers. While the Park Service will laud the contributions of volunteers, their systems were not set up to make volunteering any easier. There did not appear to be much consideration of the factors that have been discussed on RYPN regarding maintaining volunteer interest and enthusiasm, retaining volunteers, or creating an environment conducive to the recruitment of new volunteers.

"The agreement is up for review and, due to the previous failure to adhere to the review protocol, I have to conclude that this review has a very high visibility to the Regional Office in Philly."


Well those of us who've dealt with the NPS Bureaucracy over a period of years are not comforted by that fact.

Assume for a minute that there was as "sudden" discovery of the absence of prior periodic reviews sometime just prior to May, when the last update was posted at the 3713 website and the donation function was shut down.

Even if everything is resolved tomorrow; the period of interruption is now approaching five months.

When as I occasionally do, have high visibility matters in my present position-even those that require some legal review-turnaround is expected in days or at most weeks-so how leisurely will things that don't have the attention of regional higher ups take?

And every day is a day closer to the retirement of three of those most experienced shop personnel, including the PM.

One of my fellow volunteers (co614, unfortunately, I'm not a retiree getting a pension) used to quip that the cars were painted incorrectly-they should be lettered

L A C K O F W A N T O

was quite correct. Unfortunately decades of acculturated unaccountability make any effort bring back some semblance of former glory a near impossible task given any foreseeable budget and staffing-worsened by the exodus of the most experienced staff and a volunteer corps that will have become accustomed to Saturdays under the comforter, rather than the tyranny of the early alarm. I can tell you from prior experience that when people are confronted with futility, they do one of two things: either they leave (see, Conway D) or they develop mindless rituals that promote the appearance of being busy in the hopes that they will appear indispensable in pursuit of unqualifiable or immeasurable goals and objectives.

That means training new people-both paid and volunteer-with all of the rigor and paperwork that will be imposed by 49 CFR Part 243.

Now three years away from my last trick, some scales have fallen off my eyes and the Stockholm Syndrome is healing.

Unfortunately, the NPS simply isn't up to the task of running an operating railroad museum- all its "core competencies" are in maintaining static facilities such as battlefields, birthplaces or similar things or the natural places such as Yellowstone.

There are times, when you write an audit report and the recommendation is "management should correct [INSERT DEFICIENCY HERE]" and you realize that there simply isn't enough interest, aptitude or resources to implement a workable plan.

It was fun while it lasted.

Good morning Sup - Not trying to give comfort there - it just is what it is. After reading your exhaustive (I mean that in a thorough way) posts over the years it is gratifying to see that you have finally developed a realistic view of STEA. If you do not understand what I mean, go through some of my many posts on the subject.

As for Conway, she was never supposed to be around for a while. Anyone with half a brain that was involved in the hiring process knew that she was given a checklist of benchmarks and that, once accomplished, she was moving on up and out.

One of those "to do" items was establishing a "friends of" group. We had been working with Kip on an ambitious plan for that when we were shut down. She had two choices - try to make a deal with us or work with your group. We had been through enough with the Park Service so that we came to the table with a set of expectations on how we wanted to do business within the confines of the restrictive Park Service system. Your group was more accommodating/eager to get it done. So she worked with you and stopped returning our calls, leaving us in limbo for a while to keep us on the back burner in the event your deal did not go through. We had an exchange on this board about this a while back. You getting it now?

So take care, stay in touch with the good people who are still around, and find a more deserving preservation effort to donate your resources to. As far as STEA goes, my focus is on making sure folks know about all the stuff that has not seen any care since the Park Service took over. Not to make the Park Service look bad but rather to foster an environment where the Park Service sees options to having a bunch of artifacts slowly reach maximum entropy under their watch. Peace out Napoleon.