Strasburg July 11th

[arizonachris]

I have a little Kodak Z740 digital, but it can't compare to the shots you get, Sty. With the Easy Share software, I can clean it up somewhat, but, your stuff is great!

OK, now I'm gonna have to go to the Pomona Rail Museum (open to public last Saturday of the month) and get some pics of the Big Boy and Challenger and the other locos they have on static display. Shame they cant run these locos any more.

[styckx]

It's not that they can't per say, it's that financially and historically in a lot of cases it doesn't make any sense. In all honesty it's a wonder the Challenger was even refurbished and kept running. I don't even want to imagine the cost of keeping that beast up to FRA standards + everyday maintenance. A lot of museums have the means if they wanted to restore some of their collection to running standards but more often than not their collection is unique and houses one of a kind classes that simply don't exist anymore, the work required to get them running would involve replacing so much stuff it wouldn't exactly be "old" in some respects anymore or the engine is part of a significant piece of history in American Railroading.

Tis is such the case with PRR 7002 and 1223. They ran as late as 1989 @ Strasburg doing steam excursions. They were on lease to Strasburg from the PRR Museum. They required a hefty amount of work and PRR Museum decided not to let Strasburg do the work and didn't renew the lease. Opting instead to preserve them as is on static display instead of having a lot of new items be built for them. Beautiful beasts.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hKWPXOmtCJ8

Now.. (my photos) They sit silently facing each other across the street from where they last ran.

[Shortliner]

I wonder if it's also due to Insurance cost, esp. considering when you have a locomotive that's the last of it's class.

[qrfan3]

Thanks for the heads up Bill...
I am no photography buff but the sharpness and depth of detail of the two #90 shots are of good quality I believe as a viewer.

Shorty...
Cannot speak for US but downunder this is one of the issues, also regulation and cost to run these beautiful monsters is another factor. The greenies jump on board with pollution and the likes....and sadly a lot of the craftsmanship of the great men who serviced and maintained these machines has slowly been lost which leaves new technology and the great costs of maintaining such...hence, if it don't make good money then it's not worth the costs and effort.
We have just lost our only running QR Beyer Garrat to a static display because of running costs.