HEADS UP: Heritage Units on NS Southern Tier

blockline4180 wrote:

Matt Langworthy wrote:
Tainted? I prefer the term informed when it comes to RR history. While both EL and PC failed, EL fixed its management problems early on. Bill White and Greg Maxwell are remembered well for keeping EL afloat in a very difficult era. They contrast strongly with Sanders' green team at PC, which was eseentailly committing fraud. A railroad is more than just its routes- there are also people in the equation. Sanders was the Ken Lay of the late '60s/early '70s. That does matter, IMO. And speaking of people, EL was the only CR predecessor which didn't ask the ICC for permission to completel cease operations. As note by one observer, EL didn't know the meaning of the word quit.

And yes, I did see PC in my early years. The I lived in Elmira until May of 1976, so I saw PC freight action occasionally on ther Elmira Branch. I also saw PC trains on the Corning Branch a few times. However, PC was not one of my Big 5- the RRs which made me a railffan: EL, LV, the B&H, the LA&L and the Strasburg RR. I can certainly understand your love of the Horseshore Curve- it was and is an impressive location. However, Pennsy rather than Penn Central made the Horseshore Curve. Therefore, Pennsy is the history we should celebrate.

That being said, I hope that NS will consider adding an EL heritage unit, since they're going to have a PC heritage unit. Diamonds trump mating worms, as far as I'm concerned.

Amen Matt!!

Very well stated on all accounts!!!
Unfortunately, I have this unsettling feeling NS won't do a Erie Lackawanna Heritage unit, but it is always nice to think someone else might someday!!

Thank you. The Delaware-Lackawanna basically has an EL heritage scheme on some of their C425s, although I'd love to see NS create it for one their locomotives. IMO, 20 is a nice, round number.

Windseeker1 wrote:And I don't begrudge a man his opinion either.

I don't begrudge you your opinion, either. I have a love/hate relationship with CR (which would take too long to explain here), but I will enjoy seeing the CR heritage unit on the Tier.

Matt Langworthy wrote: By the same token, NS's Pennsy unit and New York Central unit could represent the territories that came to make up Penn Central.

Significantly different paintscheme and name in that case. A Erie Lackawanna heritage unit would be the Lackawanna paint scheme with a variation on the nose of the Erie logo with Erie added before Lackawanna on the flanks of the locomotive.

But again I'd love to see one and I'm not trying to argue against it or say it isn't deserving of recognition (I think it is). I'm just proposing a possible reason for why the merged system isn't represented in this program. Limited budget I presume and they couldn't represent every line and every paint scheme that they probably would've loved to have done given unlimited resources. I assume the Penn Central unit will be pretty cheap to do as far as paintschemes go and Erie Lackawanna, with its obvious similarities to its predecessors (and much more expensive paint scheme) is already being paid homage to in a way.

So I imagine it was sacrificed for greater variety to represent a system whose identity disappeared completely when merged away (Unlike the EL which combined the two names of its components, adapted one of the paint schemes, and adapted a variaton on the other's logo). At least it beats having Erie and Erie Lackawanna represented like their initial plans were when word leaked out. Doing seperate units for each does equal justice to both components of the Erie Lackawanna.

Leo_Ames wrote:

Matt Langworthy wrote: By the same token, NS's Pennsy unit and New York Central unit could represent the territories that came to make up Penn Central.

Significantly different paintscheme and name in that case. A Erie Lackawanna heritage unit would be the Lackawanna paint scheme with a variation on the nose of the Erie logo with Erie added before Lackawanna on the flanks of the locomotive.

But again I'd love to see one and I'm not trying to argue against it or say it isn't deserving of recognition (I think it is). I'm just proposing a possible reason for why the merged system isn't represented in this program. Limited budget I presume and they couldn't represent every line and every paint scheme that they probably would've loved to have done given unlimited resources. I assume the Penn Central unit will be pretty cheap to do as far as paintschemes go and Erie Lackawanna, with its obvious similarities to its predecessors (and much more expensive paint scheme) is already being paid homage to in a way.

So I imagine it was sacrificed for greater variety to represent a system whose identity disappeared completely when merged away (Unlike the EL which combined the two names of its components, adapted one of the paint schemes, and adapted a variaton on the other's logo). At least it beats having Erie and Erie Lackawanna represented like their initial plans were when word leaked out. Doing seperate units for each does equal justice to both components of the Erie Lackawanna.

True, on all acounts, but all I wanted to see was the EL Diamond with the L and "E dashes" inside the diamond on the nose!!! I don;t think that is asking for much!!

One more argument in favor of adding an Erie Lackawanna heritage unit- EL lasted twice as long as PC did and even turned a profit for a few years.

Matt Langworthy wrote:One more argument in favor of adding an Erie Lackawanna heritage unit- EL lasted twice as long as PC did and even turned a profit for a few years.

AMEN!!!!

I think if everyone who reads this thread wrote a letter back to NS Corporate office, then they might consider it!
Who is in??

[/quote]

Tainted? I prefer the term informed when it comes to RR history. While both EL and PC failed, EL fixed its management problems early on. Bill White and Greg Maxwell are remembered well for keeping EL afloat in a very difficult era. They contrast strongly with Sanders' green team at PC, which was eseentailly committing fraud. A railroad is more than just its routes- there are also people in the equation. Sanders was the Ken Lay of the late '60s/early '70s. [/quote]


You might want to inform yourself a little more about PC. Sanders? The man you are trying to vilify is Saunders,Stuart T. who ran both N&W
and the PRR before PC. I wouldn't think he was on any team except Penn Centrals,but if he was it would be the red team as he was PRRs ceo.

There is a family connection with Penn Central and N&W, PC at one time owned 23% of N&W and is,like it or not, part of NS's heritage.But I
think they should do an EL unit as well.

Charles

RSD15 wrote:
There is a family connection with Penn Central and N&W, PC at one time owned 23% of N&W and is,like it or not, part of NS's heritage.But I
think they should do an EL unit as well.

Charles

Charles,

Didn't N&W also own at least half or most of EL from 1968 to 1972 through Dereco?? I could be wrong, but I remember seeing photos of N&W units on EL tracks in NY during the late 60's.

RSD15 wrote:You might want to inform yourself a little more about PC. Sanders? The man you are trying to vilify is Saunders,Stuart T. who ran both N&W
and the PRR before PC. I wouldn't think he was on any team except Penn Centrals,but if he was it would be the red team as he was PRRs ceo.

There is a family connection with Penn Central and N&W, PC at one time owned 23% of N&W and is,like it or not, part of NS's heritage.But I
think they should do an EL unit as well.

Charles

Penn Central never owned N&W stock. The ICC forced the Pennsy to divest itself of its N&W shares as a prelude to the merger. Nitpick about red vs green all you want, but Saunders and his team at PC continued the same practices from the Pennsy i.e. divesting revenue in outside ventures and dividends, rather than using it to improve the Pennsy's physical plant. I don't care what Saunders accomplished with the N&W, because his actions at Pennsy/PC were blatantly immoral.


P.S. One shouldn't criticize another poster's spelling if one can't use the quote marks correctly.

blockline4180 wrote:Charles,

Didn't N&W also own at least half or most of EL from 1968 to 1972 through Dereco?? I could be wrong, but I remember seeing photos of N&W units on EL tracks in NY during the late 60's.

Yes, the N&W owned EL (and the the D&H) via Dereco. The stock relationship was rather complicated. I suggest reading H. Roger Grant's Erie Lackawanna: Death Of An American Railroad 1938-1992 for an explanation of Preferred A vs. Preferred B stock, which was part of the Dereco transaction.

The Southern unit is done. It looks really sharp! Those of you on facebook can see it here at this link. Maybe everyone can see it, I'm not sure how NS has their page set up.

https://www.facebook.com/#!/photo.php?f ... =1&theater

Better link here:
http://www.railpictures.net/images/d1/8 ... 276991.jpg

To the coal fields it goes........never to be seen again.

DutchRailnut wrote:Better link here:
http://www.railpictures.net/images/d1/8 ... 276991.jpg

what does little "K" after numbers means?


looks great...

Someone at the Kalmbach forums called it a computer check letter. A search about it makes it sound like it was a way to double check that the number you were inputting for a specific locomotive into their computer system was correct for the unit. If the number and the letter didn't match up, the computer would tell you there was an error.

Nice touch on their part. And the letter is correct as well.

http://www.trainweb.org/tnvalley/srlcc/srlcc.html