Sad news out of Tigard - Oregon & Northwestern #2, a Baldwin AS-616, is in the process of being scrapped rather than finding a new home at a museum.
The locomotive was sitting in Tigard on a spur off of Hunsiker Road for many years, seemingly ignored. A city dog park installed a few years ago put the locomotive in the spotlight of dog owners, and vandals - as it and a few passenger cars also stored on the spur were sprayed with grafitti, broken into, torched - you name in. Two of the cars, a former Great Northern coach and a Southern Pacific Pullman car were moved to unknown destinations about a year ago, but another coach and the locomotive remained.
Recently, P&W moved in a string of spine cars, and for some reason moved them in behind the AS-616 and the coach. This might have been a glimmer of hope for them to be moved out soon - but instead it was simply to make it easier for the scrappers.
This evening, most of the access doors were removed; the cab saw the light of day for the first time in a long time, and the handrails were strewn about the ballast. Judging from the TV show "boneyard", within a few days this locomotive will be nothing but scrap loaded into a gondola or dump truck and probably taken to be melted down in McMinnville at the steel mill, turned into rebar.
The locomotive was originally purchased by the Pacific Northwest Chapter NHRS, and in the final years of the O&NW was a parts source for the other three AS-616s. Fortunately, the other three locomotives are in museums - in California (two at Portola, one in San Diego). The PNWC ended up selling/donating the unit to the National Museum of Transport in St. Louis, but that museum never transported the locomotive. It's unclear why/how, but shortly all that'll be left of the locomotive are photographs and memories.
Sorry for the poor quality of the photograph as it was taken with a cell phone camera about 5:00 PM this evening.
The locomotive was sitting in Tigard on a spur off of Hunsiker Road for many years, seemingly ignored. A city dog park installed a few years ago put the locomotive in the spotlight of dog owners, and vandals - as it and a few passenger cars also stored on the spur were sprayed with grafitti, broken into, torched - you name in. Two of the cars, a former Great Northern coach and a Southern Pacific Pullman car were moved to unknown destinations about a year ago, but another coach and the locomotive remained.
Recently, P&W moved in a string of spine cars, and for some reason moved them in behind the AS-616 and the coach. This might have been a glimmer of hope for them to be moved out soon - but instead it was simply to make it easier for the scrappers.
This evening, most of the access doors were removed; the cab saw the light of day for the first time in a long time, and the handrails were strewn about the ballast. Judging from the TV show "boneyard", within a few days this locomotive will be nothing but scrap loaded into a gondola or dump truck and probably taken to be melted down in McMinnville at the steel mill, turned into rebar.
The locomotive was originally purchased by the Pacific Northwest Chapter NHRS, and in the final years of the O&NW was a parts source for the other three AS-616s. Fortunately, the other three locomotives are in museums - in California (two at Portola, one in San Diego). The PNWC ended up selling/donating the unit to the National Museum of Transport in St. Louis, but that museum never transported the locomotive. It's unclear why/how, but shortly all that'll be left of the locomotive are photographs and memories.
Sorry for the poor quality of the photograph as it was taken with a cell phone camera about 5:00 PM this evening.
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Erik Halstead - Portland, Oregon
Erik Halstead - Portland, Oregon