NYSW 142 - October 2002 Excursion

Eric S Strohmeyer wrote:The trip you are talking about was for Dunellen's Railroad Days. It was not October however, but rather September 7-8, 2002. If you saw the train tied up in Bound Brook, it was Sunday, September 8th. The train would have been waiting for the CSAO crew to arrive to shuttle them back to North Bergen. If I recall correctly, the Conrail crew arrived at just about midnight.

The train actually laid over in the old CNJ yard in Dunellen on the evenings of Friday, Sept 6th and Saturday, Sept 7th. The last trip of the day went towards High Bridge. The first three round trips only went to North Branch station.

I remember going out for Dunellen Railroad Days... like I said before, I seem to remember there were two trips in New Jersey about two weeks apart from each other. But do we think my shots from Dunellen, Dover, Raritan, and Bound Brook are all from September 2002?

http://flickr.com/photos/ottomatic77/se ... 133998317/

The bunch of shots you have there with Catenary over the train appears to be the NJT Morristown line. Looks like the train came up west the M&E and then went east down the Boonton/Montclair line.

Oh! What about LINCOLN PARK RAILROAD DAYS? Ring a bell with anyone?

Otto Vondrak wrote:Oh! What about LINCOLN PARK RAILROAD DAYS? Ring a bell with anyone?

Yes, I believe it ran in September 2002 and then again sometime in the Fall of 2003... The 2002 trips had the 142 on the west end and I believe the E9 on the east end.. A few trips went west of Dover, the others only as far as just west of Denville Int. The 2003 runs had other power on some of the trips.

I have video, but no stills sadly.

Eric S Strohmeyer wrote:Good Evening Otto,

The trip you are talking about was for Dunellen's Railroad Days. It was not October however, but rather September 7-8, 2002. If you saw the train tied up in Bound Brook, it was Sunday, September 8th. The train would have been waiting for the CSAO crew to arrive to shuttle them back to North Bergen. If I recall correctly, the Conrail crew arrived at just about midnight.

The train actually laid over in the old CNJ yard in Dunellen on the evenings of Friday, Sept 6th and Saturday, Sept 7th. The last trip of the day went towards High Bridge. The first three round trips only went to North Branch station.

Dunellen's Railroad Days event ran for four years, 2000, 2002-2004. The terrorists attacks of September 11th, 2001 cancelled the event for that year. The last year was the year of the "incident at CP Cape, aka the Center Street fiasco " which has been beaten to death on these threads. Now, four years later, it is still very much a thorn in the side of NJT labor. Today, the URHS in Boonton is the recipient of that anger all these years later.

Hope that is of some help.

Eric S. Strohmeyer

I remember that the #142 trip in 2004 was from the Westfield station. I even have a newspaper insert from the Star-Ledger that had a color photo of the #142 celebrating Westfield's R.R.Days.The earlier 2002 & 2003 trips were from Dunellen. I remember that it rained later inthe day. I rode the train in the morning and after it returned to Westfield it started to rain. I have photo's that I took from Westfield's station with the #142 pulling west. Trainbuff109

So I'm probably safe labeling my shots September 2002. There's so many mixed and mingled together, I don't remember what trip was what anymore.

-otto-

Can someone explain why they don't run these trips on NJT anymore or on their own trackage from North Bergen to Baird's Farm (Warwick, NY) anymore? Is it because they're too busy with the Phillipsburg operation and it would be a pain in the butt to shuttle the train back and forth over to Easton, then back into NJ and east on NS? Would NS even let them take the train anywhere from Pburg even empty? I rode the steam trip from Susquehanna Transfer (North Bergen) to Baird's Farm (Warwick, NY) in October, 2000. The train backed up from point of origin with the E's on the south end pushing 4 miles up to Little Ferry, then #142 hooked on at the north end. On the return trip #142 was dropped off at Little Ferry.

This question was answered in the last issue ot the NYSWTHS Reflector. It has nothing to do with Phillipsburg, and if we were still allowed/able to run those fall foliage trains, we would be on it in a heartbeat. The short answer to your question is money and insurance. You can thank Osama Bin Laden for that one.

The THS had an excurstion from Hoboken to Port Jervis planned in 2004, and after approval, were told that NS would not allow it. We also had a private Police train planned to run on the NYSW, had approval, and that too was canned by NS. Our last weekend of fall trips in 2002 almost didn't run, but since the train was already sold out, NS allowed us to run it, but said no to the Santa trips that year, which caused us to go to NJT.

Moving the 142 out of Phillipsburg can be done, but since it requires a trip on NS, however short or long, it becomes a very expensive trip. They have been cooperative with the THS in the past, and hopefully will in the future, but every move also requires FRA waivers and approval, which takes time.