Making Up an Executive Passenger Train for 1971?

[Kisatchie]

I'm thinking about making an Executive train for my Kisatchie, Gulf & Northern in 1971. Am I way off if I use Micro-Trains heavyweight passenger cars? I know it's my railroad and I can do what I want. I guess I could say the cars were restored for the comfort of the near-bankrupt KG&N's rich executives.


Hmm... I know how to get
rich: don't invest in any
of Kiz's stocks...

[ljudice]

I could be off base, but I don't think railroads started putting whole trains together like this until the 1980's or even 1990's...  In the 1970's they probably still had active passenger cars that could be combined with some business cars to make a special.

There were certainly tons of business cars around and 1-2 could also be tucked on a  regular passenger train or even a freight train.  I would think modernized heavyweight cars would be ideal, with A/C and some sort of power source, fuel tank for operating on freight trains.

The dedicated "office car trains" were more part of taking customers around for wining and dining - and post Amtrak, when the RR's had dwindling fleets of passenger cars at their disposal.

[jmlaboda]

"I could be off base, but I don't think railroads started putting whole trains together like this until the 1980's or even 1990's..."

  Gee... that would be news to Southern Railway, which ran their Kentucky Derby Specials (for executives and large share holders) since the late-50s, a tradition that Norfolk Southern carries on to this day.

There are a number of examples of executive trains that can be sited well before Amtrak, though the use of heavyweights would be kind of limited to the Plan 3959 observation car as a stand-in for a business car since sleepers such as the 12 Section - 1 Drawing Room and the 10 Section - 1 Drawing Room -2 Compartment cars would be a bit lacking in better accommodations.  The MT coach could be modified to a six bedroom car with the middle window of every three being sealed up on one side, with the last window being a crew room, to make a crude sort of executive sleeper.

[LV LOU]

Kiz,if you're asking about the actual cars,no problem,I have heavyweight passenger cars running right past my front door even today on the Reading & Northern  and the Lehigh Gorge Scenic RR,also the CP and Steamtown....
   As far as actual executive "trains",I don't believe too many railroads would have had a dedicated train for such things like NS has,or Conrail did have,but they certainly would have had Specials that were put together from their existing cars for wining & dining the upper brass,and prospective shippers.

[nkalanaga]

The SP&S ran heavyweights in general service through the BN merger until Amtrak canceled their trains.  Most of their head-end cars, and many of the coaches were heavyweights, although as far as I know they never had a sleeping car, not needing one for their short runs.

There's no reason your railroad couldn't use them as an executive train, especially if you serve an area with few good roads, where potential customers would be more likely to ride the train than drive to a business site.

[ljudice]

"I could be off base, but I don't think railroads started putting whole trains together like this until the 1980's or even 1990's..."

  Gee... that would be news to Southern Railway, which ran their Kentucky Derby Specials (for executives and large share holders) since the late-50s, a tradition that Norfolk Southern carries on to this day.

Do you seriously think I didn't know about special passenger trains like this?

Do you read a post before offering mocking criticism of it????

[TiVoPrince]

1971
Loads of newly surplus passenger cars that did not make the cut for AMTRAK were out there.  Likely that anything that was scrapped or become MOW could be had for small money.  I have some doubt that a lot of historic stuff was available but a string of Kato business cars with assorted well faded lightweight stuff is a somewhat plausable alternate reality...

[Kisatchie]

Let's see... Southern and a few other RRs maintained their passenger trains while Amtrak was starting up. I guess I could say my KG&N RR maintained its passenger trains too. I think I could fit in an all-heavyweight train.

Thanks for all the info!


Hmm... I'm rushing out
and buying a ticket...

[jmlaboda]

"Do you seriously think I didn't know about special passenger trains like this?

"Do you read a post before offering mocking criticism of it????"

Yes, I did read what you wrote and I simply pointed out that OCS trains, while not called that, were in use before the time you stated.  There were a number of reasons and a number of operations that did this, some of which are documented on the Passenger Train Consist List at Yahoo! groups.  I apologize for the sarcasm but the truth is that these trains did exist well before the Amtrak era and specific cars were built for that purpose.

[Denver Road Doug]

In 1971, on a near bankrupt railroad, an "Employee Appreciation" trip would probably involve them riding in the cab!!!   

[nkalanaga]

Naaahhh, put folding chairs on a flatcar!  The big brass would ride in the cab, annoying the crew and generally getting in the way, but the workers would be out in the heat and humidity.  Or the rain, depending on the season.  Either way they'd have mosquitoes...

Too cheap for folding chairs?  They can always sit on used crossties.  A few splinters and some creosote never hurt anyone.  Assuming the ties aren't so old that the creosote has all leached out, if they were ever treated in the first place.

Leave the broken and rotted deck boards in place and they can inspect the track as they ride.  Might as well get some work out of them!

[donr928]

In 1956, I was a freshman at Texas A & M.  After the UT game I went to the train station to get a ride home to Dallas.  The next train was some hours later that evening.  While I was wondering what to do, I was approached by the conductor os a passenger train sitting on the track.  He told me to come on get on the train,  It was leaving for Dallas in a few minutes.  A rich manufactured has hired the train to haul current and prospective customers to different sporting events across the country.  They had a bar car, a lounge, with live band, a dinning car and sleepers.  One of the band members told me that they he been on the train, starting in Seattle and had been all over the west and were going to New Orleans after Dallas.  It was a drunken ball.

[seusscaboose]

1971
Loads of newly surplus passenger cars that did not make the cut for AMTRAK were out there. 

At the time, $10K would get you a fully furnished car from most of the big RR's (I am referencing PC in The Windy City)

Ask me how I know 

Of course, you had to pay to move it, but the point is, Any car, Fully Furnished,

[brokemoto]

New Jersey Transit was still operating standard cars with clerestory roofs on their CNJ commuter trains into the early 1980s.  I have had relatives in Jersey for years, so I rode NJT/CNJ trains when I went to visit them.  They were operating in push/pull in the early 1980s.  Admittedly, there is a major difference between a commuter train and an executive train, but if standard passenger cars were still operating in the early 1980s, there is no reason why they could not be operating in 1971.

I used to ride the Capitol Limited home from high school before AMTRAK.  Before I discovered that the commuters owned the bar car between Washington and Cumberland, I used to ride in the other cars.  I remember riding in a HW combine more than once.  I also remember seeing an occasional HW on that train.  If a large road still operated HWs on its premier passenger train that late, there is no reason why a short line could not.

If this is a going bankrupt non-historic, no doubt it has discontinued most, if not all, of its passenger trains, thus it could have some equipment left that it had decided, for whatever reason, not to sell for its scrap value.  Most short lines did not buy new lightweight equipment, especially if they did not have the money for it.  Thus, those that did operate passenger service would have done so with either steel HWs or even wood cars.

I would say go for it.  If I saw a pike set in the 1970s with a HW executive train, I would not question it.

[randgust]

One of the oddball things of 1971-2 was that any passenger car to be used in an AMTRAK consist was supposed to have the platinum mist and Phase 1 stripes by Amtrak edict.    I think that was largely ignored, but hey..... if that's something you like, you could do it.

When I rode out west in '72 the Amtrak train from LA to SF (Coast Daylight?) had two heavyweight private cars on it bringing up the end; open-end observations, never did get a look at them.    I don't think you'd be wrong at all with heavyweights, particularly in the 70's, I'm amazed how many are still out there today if you dig around a bit.   LA&L has the "Traveler" running today, I've even ridden in it.  If you're looking for the 'prototype shortline that runs heavyweight office car specials' I'll offer them up.

Here's a 2010 shot:  http://rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=2570176

They do a few runs on the system every year, as many as 3 cars and two units on the front; I've got my own photo collection.