beyer_garratt
New member
Holy hell look what the cat dragged in. :wave:
The year is 1972. I find myself with a massive logistical nightmare. I own a coal mine on the side of a mountain. I also own a port 30km away. How do I get coal from A) to B) efficiently?
The amount of coal I shift each week produces an appalling amount of traffic, which the local backroads simply weren't built to take. Also I don't care much for truckies. Such an unruly bunch.
With the rising cost of oil and its bi-products, diesel-electric is not a feasible option, neither is overhead electric (I'm only a millionaire, not a billionaire!).
Now, I have free fuel in the form of coal sitting under my feet, and free water running along side. I also happen to have a bit of a soft-spot for steam traction, and being company CEO, what I say, goes.
It's a no brainer. Bring in the contractors and tear down those hillsides! It's time to lay some rails!
In 1978, With some hand-me-down engines and rolling stock purchased from various railroad graveyards, resurrected and painstakingly repainted into Garratt Mining's corporate livery (*snicker*), steam is brought back to life.
This first photo shows engine 1003, an ex-B&O switcher loading coal from the bins at the port. This is all this engine does, every day. Load at the bins, unload at the transfer station. Over. And. Over.
2-8-2 Light Baldwin no.1005 leaving the mining facility with a loaded train snails across the wooden trestle, one of 14 such bridges on the line.
1003 once again, this time climbing the inline up to the ship loading dump.
1003 unloads its train at the top of the bins.
1003 runs through the gauntlet of tracks that forms the mouth of the port.
The engine sheds, with ex-UP 0-6-0's 1001 and 1002 sitting in someone else's sheds. Every loco owned by the company has its own shed.
1003 loading coal at the bins again. Did I mention thats all this poor little thing ever does?
1005 meanders down the river towards the port.
The year is 1972. I find myself with a massive logistical nightmare. I own a coal mine on the side of a mountain. I also own a port 30km away. How do I get coal from A) to B) efficiently?
The amount of coal I shift each week produces an appalling amount of traffic, which the local backroads simply weren't built to take. Also I don't care much for truckies. Such an unruly bunch.
With the rising cost of oil and its bi-products, diesel-electric is not a feasible option, neither is overhead electric (I'm only a millionaire, not a billionaire!).
Now, I have free fuel in the form of coal sitting under my feet, and free water running along side. I also happen to have a bit of a soft-spot for steam traction, and being company CEO, what I say, goes.
It's a no brainer. Bring in the contractors and tear down those hillsides! It's time to lay some rails!
In 1978, With some hand-me-down engines and rolling stock purchased from various railroad graveyards, resurrected and painstakingly repainted into Garratt Mining's corporate livery (*snicker*), steam is brought back to life.
This first photo shows engine 1003, an ex-B&O switcher loading coal from the bins at the port. This is all this engine does, every day. Load at the bins, unload at the transfer station. Over. And. Over.
2-8-2 Light Baldwin no.1005 leaving the mining facility with a loaded train snails across the wooden trestle, one of 14 such bridges on the line.
1003 once again, this time climbing the inline up to the ship loading dump.
1003 unloads its train at the top of the bins.
1003 runs through the gauntlet of tracks that forms the mouth of the port.
The engine sheds, with ex-UP 0-6-0's 1001 and 1002 sitting in someone else's sheds. Every loco owned by the company has its own shed.
1003 loading coal at the bins again. Did I mention thats all this poor little thing ever does?
1005 meanders down the river towards the port.
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