Greetings all;
My apologies that I have not been able to respond latel. We have been very busy as we continue to reinvent the WMSR in general and rebuild #1309 in particular. Not to mention that since October, we have been at the height of our season. In fact, the WMSR had the highest-ever single month ridership this October and our highest one-day ridership recorded in our history, again in October.
As usual, there has been some excellent discussion and good questions raised here and on other boards. I'd like to take the opportunity to dispel rumors and clarify what is happening with the WMSR.
The first has to do with the possibilities of other locomotives filling in until #1309 is completed. I have examined the possibility to have a "fill-in" locomotive, but we just do not believe the cost will justify the investment, let alone earning a return on the investment. When you think about the delay, it is in reality only about 90-days; hardly enough to justify an estimated $60K to get a "hired gun" to the WMSR. This doesn't include any lease payments, just movement costs. Even if we could get a locomotive moved in at little or no cost, we have to consider the physical railroad itself. The C&P section of the WMSR has significantly tighter curves than many railroads, to include a 22-degree curve at Frostburg. Many locomotives don't like such tight curves, while other locomotives may have high horsepower but not the tractive effort we need. Regarding other diesels for lease, a pretty paint job or certain body design doesn't mean a locomotive is reliable, and we have to have reliability. I would love to get our GP-30's painted as they are looking tired, but we've put nearly $100K into them this year to improve their reliability--a significant sum when we are also trying to rebuild #1309. However, that investment paid off this year as while they aren't perfect, we didn't have to cancel any trips due to power availability.
A question arose about the timing of #1309. I arrived at the WMSR on April 15th and took the reigns on May 10th, 2013. I started asking questions about #734's remaining boiler time (approximately 300 days at the time), rebuild plan and allocated budget. The plan was to rebuild #734 in the 5-month off-season with a budget of approximately $400K. While I am not a steam expert, I've known many other projects managed by excellent leaders that ran into enough problems to know that this plan didn't have a high probability of success. By late June of 2013, we started to look for a new steam locomotive that had the a) tractive effort, b) fuel economy, c) axle loading and, d) flexibility to be considered. While we considered a total of 5 locomotives, we ultimately decided to pursue the #1309. By the time we were able to announce our decision to acquire the #1309 from the B&O Museum, it was May of 2014. When we were able to line up movement, we lifted the #1309 and began prepping for shipment on July 10th, 2014. #1309 arrived at the WMSR July 24th, 2014. We plan on releasing #1309 on July 24th, 2016; the two-year anniversary of her arrival. If she is done early, we expect to press her into service early!
Regarding #734, we are going to pay-off #1309's rebuild first before we undertake any new steam locomotive rebuilds. Remember, we do not have a class 1 backing us; this is a grass-roots effort! Also, WMSR will be placing money in a protected investment account to ensure her next rebuild will be paid for in advance. For each operating day, #1309 will have approximately $500 per operating day placed into the rebuild fund; a move which I have already had passed by our Board of Directors. This will take nearly $50K per year from our operating funds, as well as money from #734's potential rebuild, but this will ensure that #1309 will be properly maintained for years to come. Quite simply, as the last commercially built steam locomotive constructed for a U.S. railroad, she deserves nothing less. Speaking of #734, we expect that rebuild to be even more costly than #1309. She has been a workhorse for us, and deserves some much needed TLC.
At the end of the 2015 operating year, #734 will have approximately 18 days left on her boiler before her current annual inspection expires in mid-April. We are planning to have a number of special events such as a VIP charter in January, photo freight charter for Pete Lerro Productions on Feb 17th, and a number of WMSR Foundation events. We are also considering some events in March. In short, we do not expect to have enough days left on #734's boiler to justify an annual inspection and hydro-test to operate in 2016.
With regard to our donation drive, we have limited the number of certificates to the number of operating days and capacity we expect to see #1309 operate in 2016. I can not emphasize this enough--once we sell out, we will not allocate any more certificates for cab rides or our guest engineer program (Hands on the Throttle) for 2016. The donation program is the only way to get a cab ride or your Hands on the Throttle of #1309 in 2016. And yes, #1309 will be ready!
I hope this helps to clarify some of the questions, and I look forward to seeing you on the WMSR soon!
Mike Gresham
General Superintendent
WMSR
