Official Belfast & Moosehead Lake Thread - 2009

[Cowford]

Chill out, dude. It's pretty clear that your "realists" comments were directed to me, but I could care less. And I didn't mean the sunshine comment to be nasty and I'll edit it out.

[gokeefe]

Official Website of the Brooks Preservation Society:

http://www.brookspreservation.org/index.htm

Better organized and more up to date website than many other historic railroad preservation efforts in Northern New England.

[calaisbranch]

Yeah, I freaked out a bit. I also went and edited my piece quite a bit.

[gokeefe]

An article from today's Kennebec Journal describes a very large new pellet mill that is being built in Burnham adjacent to Pride Manufacturing (dba Pride Sports, hardwood golf tee manufacturers). The new pellet mill will take waste from the Pride Sports, mix it with softwoods and make wood pellets to be used as heating fuel. Both the new pellet mill and Pride Manufacturing are tantalizingly close to railroad access. The current Pride property is approximately 250 ft. from the north leg of the B&ML wye to the PAR main line.

Although this opportunity seems to be present for the use of either the B&ML or PAR for freight I suspect as usual PAR will be reluctant to take advantage of this opportunity.

Not knowing who owns the wye, B&ML seems to have at least an opportunity to develop a switching business. I understand that the current museum operators in Brooks aren't exactly equipped for this type of business but regardless I don't think the 3rd largest pellet mill in Maine sitting within a few hundred feet of state owned lines is something that won't attract interest from Maine DOT towards development of future rail operations.

Link to the Kennebec Journal article:
http://kennebecjournal.mainetoday.com/n ... 45579.html

Link to Google Map:
http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&source= ... 17&iwloc=A

[MikeVT]

Is it just me or does it seem like lots of tourist railroads starting/expanding over the last couple of years? Not sure the market can support all of them.

[gokeefe]

MikeVT,

The 'tourist' operation in Brooks is acutally the remnant of the B&ML that collapsed about two years ago now. This is one instance that represents a contraction of an operation that previously was much larger, and included a steam operation.

Maine has seen its fair share of expansion in this area with the Downeast Scenic Railroad (DESR) and the Wiscasset, Waterville & Farmington (WW&F) being two of the more recent additions. I'm not counting the Maine Eastern (MER) operation in part because the Maine Coast Railroad previously was running 'tourist' trains as well. However, a key difference is that Maine Eastern has done such a good job of running their operation that they clearly have had a much larger impact on the market.

Because these railroads draw off separate independent local economies their success seems to be more dependent on local or 'micro' economic conditions, and the specific circumstances of the railroad itself than any larger or aggregate 'demand' for passenger excursion service. Notice that although B&ML failed, due in large part to their own circumstances, the Downeast Scenic Railroad has managed to conduct a rebuild program on standard gauge track that hasn't seen regular service since the early 1980's, much like the B&ML.

[gokeefe]

Does anyone know where the former B&ML gift shop car is headed?

http://photos.nerail.org/showpic/?20091 ... 615748.jpg

[thebigham]

Another pic here:

http://naphotos.nerail.org/s/?p=156234

[Dick H]

On another list, there was a blurb that the two B&ML cars were
headed to Wilmington NC. There is the Wilmington Railroad
Museum there, which has some prototype equipment on display.
They do not actually operate any trains. If you run the link below,
there is a list of tourist railroads in North Carolina, but it does not
appear any of them operate in Wilmington. The Museum is also shown.
http://www.trainweb.org/nrmrc/museums.html

Dick

[gokeefe]

What is the heritage of these cars?

[bwparker1]

http://brookspreservation.org/index.htm

I am out of the loop, but just stumbled across this... Can someone remind me how/when the rails into Belfast were yanked and under what conditions? - BWP

[Mikejf]

I don't remember the date but it was a few years ago, 3 to 5 or maybe more. The way it read in the paper and on the local news was the City wanted the railroad gone. And since the city owned the land, they wanted to use it for other uses. Kicked out the railroad, pulled up the rails on the shore, and that was that. Look at these photos.

http://photos.nerail.org/showpic/?photo ... ead%20Lake
http://photos.nerail.org/showpic/?photo ... ead%20Lake
http://photos.nerail.org/showpic/?photo ... ead%20Lake
http://photos.nerail.org/showpic/?photo ... ead%20Lake
http://photos.nerail.org/showpic/?photo ... ead%20Lake
http://photos.nerail.org/showpic/?photo ... ead%20Lake
http://photos.nerail.org/showpic/?photo ... ead%20Lake
Mike

[CVRA7]

After hearing of the shabby treatment its one-time owner, the city of Belfast, gave the B&ML I vowed never to spend another penny in that town again. And I haven't.

[NNR]

Reffering to the Belfast situation people need to look at both sides of the argument the railroad forfitted their lease it was only around 500 amonth they were far behind in payments and a local politican i believe a selectman even said he was very upset with how the railroad just pulled up and left there was never any plans for that property. Most people are quick to jump and defend the railroad. But come on it was a mismanaged now bankrupt operation railroads can be at fault.

[calaisbranch]

Reffering to the Belfast situation people need to look at both sides of the argument the railroad forfitted their lease it was only around 500 amonth they were far behind in payments and a local politican i believe a selectman even said he was very upset with how the railroad just pulled up and left there was never any plans for that property. Most people are quick to jump and defend the railroad. But come on it was a mismanaged now bankrupt operation railroads can be at fault.

Never any plans for that property?! The town had BIG visions to turn the waterfront into a yuppie mecka with luxury condos. See how far they got with the old Stinson plant. A skeleton since the contractor pulled out. Nothing like walking across the rebuilt foot bridge and ending up next to that carcass. Perhaps some better parking, but barely closer to developing it than they were when B&ML was supposedly behind on rent. That cracks me up in itself since the railroad contributed directly to what the waterfront was in its best days. I think both sides should let the dust settle and perhaps iron out some kind of deal. The rails do still come into town under the Route 1/3 overpass and are still walking distance to downtown, too. I wanna say the past owners of B&ML still have a section of rail between the active Brooks Preservation portion and the downtown Belfast connection.