New Puget Sound Live Steam Club

[Glenn Brooks]

Hello All,

Several of us in the PNW have been talking about forming a Grand Scale , 15” gauge, Live Steam Club (3” to 5” scale) here on the eastside of the Seattle Area - with a track in the Issaquah, North Bend, Snoqualmie Pass, I-5 corridor area.

So, thought I would post an inquiry to see if any PNW Chaski members, anyone really, would be interested in participating.

Here are some concept ideas, so far:

- Live steam club non profit, member organization - club owns equipment, provides insurance, mainline to operate, etc

- members can operate their own locomotives and rolling stock (3” to 5” scale)

- active partnership with a regional wilderness public or non profit land management agency to establish the mainline corridor

- mainline would eventually be a 1 mile to 3 mile, point to point, scenic railway leading into the Cascade foothills back country.

Our railway would be the principal transportation corridor and transport method into a watershed scale restoration area.

Three purposes of the Club would be to enable live steamers to restore and operate Park gauge equipment; give train rides during public run days to generate revenue steams; and, use the railroad to conduct back country forest restoration and land conservation projects - partnering with our sponsoring wilderness agency, and volunteer work crews.

We would like to hear your thoughts on the idea, and see if there is sufficient membership interest to form a small steering committee and hold an informational meeting and open house.

Thanks much, Certainly like to hear from you, if you are interested.

Glenn

[rkcarguy]

I like the idea, it would be some years before I would be able to participate myself unfortunately.
Have you looked into the gov't side of things regarding land use and watershed restoration?
Also, don't count out privately owned land, at least to start with. A couple decades ago I was involved in a push to get an new ORV park opened, and the timberland owner actually wanted the ORV park because it would keep the roads and trails open...otherwise they spent a lot of time and money fighting their way through grown over roads and trails trying to access their timber and/or reach fires.
Unfortunately the county and many activist groups were against it and came out of the woodwork to make sure it didn't happen, and it didn't. Expect pushback on that. Noise, any oils or greases which may drip, probably be allowed to only use propane for fuel, and so on.
Another thought, I know there was a ROW up through I-90 and some of it still remains that you can see when you go through the pass. It could be possible to gain access to a section of that, that is void of washouts/landslides and such and have an existing grade to work with that would make the build much quicker and easier?

[LIALLEGHENY]

Glenn,

If you were 2900 miles closer I would be all in.

Nyle

[Glenn Brooks]

Hey Ryan, good comment about the old RR grade up through the pass. Actually, south side of I-5 is the John Wayne iron horse trail State Park. Goes all the way to Idaho in various forms. Always wanted to Mountain bike it. are you thinking of other sections, maybe north side of the road? That would be interesting to know about. l

I used to work on Phase 1 NEPA environmental studies, so aware of the many hoops to jump through. We’re building a list of potential land management partners, starting with the major conservation groups. Nothing firm yet, but we would like to secure a right of way corridor from a conservation land manager and use the Miniature Train ROW as the primary access route into a conservation or restoration project area - close off, restore, and replace existing road networks with a light footprint miniature train mainline. Much more environmentally friendly and cheaper. RR transports everyone that way- just like the old days. Except we use the RR to restore the forest, not cut it down!

The other aspect we propose is to involve public ridership in hands-on conservation activities along the right of way - tree planting for example - come out and volunteer for the day with your kids, planting trees at end of track, etc.

[Glenn Brooks]

Glenn,

If you were 2900 miles closer I would be all in.

Nyle

Nyle, it’s supposed to be closer if you drive through Canada - Great Circle Route!



Glenn

[rkcarguy]

Yeah I was thinking in the North bend area there where they already have alot of full scale stuff, could be an easy "in" with the city as long as you can convince them to give up or share the trails they've made of most of the grades that still aren't tracked.

[rkcarguy]

My estimating "guestimator" says if you bought 6 miles of 12# rail, you'd be looking at around $1/# via a mill order, or $126,720 for rail! Probably double that for ties, gravel, and dirt work?

[Glenn Brooks]

vendor direct or direct from China vendor ? Probably the rates are extra high
With trumps tariff war. We will start small with 1/2 mile rail and try to non profit some ballast and ties. I have some leads on good recycled materials.

[rkcarguy]

Smaller steel tube and shape sizes tend to run around $1 per pound, maybe less though depending on how much you buy. Initially we saw a steel price spike clear up into the .65-.70 cents / # range on common structural shapes, but things are normalizing and/or slowing down a bit and we're back in the low 50 cent range now even high 40 cent range on some sizes/types. This is good because you can now get good US made steel for the same price it was before for Chinese steel, the tariffs are allowing the US mills to compete.
2x4's actually scale out pretty decent for 15" gage, I've continued to grab 2x4 scraps and freebies from construction sites and form wood and have yet to pay any actual money for tie lumber.

[Glenn Brooks]

Update on motive power - I’ve received interest from a local live steamer in possibly regauging his MTC G16 and running on our proposed track. So current equipment roster stands at four locomotives- the possible G16, my 1904 4-4-0, an electric center cab switcher and a scratch built sort of GE SW 1200. All four will need restoration and new livery, but have served well for 40 years, so a bit of paint and TLC on the mechanical side is to be expected. The electric center cab and 1200 will be club owned cars. The other two member owned.

Part of the charter of the Society is to promote preservation of old amusement park gauge equipment, so restoration is right in line with the charter, happily!

[NP317]

Glenn:
I always think you have such grand ideas, and probably not achievable.
And then I witness what you actually do!
So I'm expecting to see your successful creation of this large scale dream.
RussN

[rkcarguy]

I'll bring my kids down for a ride when it's operational
The original ROW's were around 14' wide right? So if you had to share part of the ROW with pedestrians on the trails would it really be a problem only needing a 3-4' wide ROW?
You going to make the yard goat into a SW1200 +/- ?